Kelly @ Turned up to Eleven! posted on
May 10, 2013
Hey Lindsay – thanks SO much for the kind words and bomb ass write up! I love it. I have a draft in my outbox waiting to finish writing to you. Thanks for this, well done!!!
P.S. The Redskins are my 2nd favorite team. My father is PA born and raised but roots for the Skins, and always have. I never forget the love of my home team but since HS I’ve been an avid Steelers fan Ravens, no way, no how!
I have thoroughly enjoyed reading Ron Charles’ reviews in the Washington Post, so I am thrilled to be introduced to this side of his work! Thank you again, InReads, for bringing your readers something thought provoking, entertaining, and downright DC:)
Leanne Tankel (author of perhaps the first self published book that RC will review???)
To be honest, this isn’t the type of movie I’d typically watch anyway, so your well-written critiques aren’t causing Stone to lose a customer. (I’m sure he’d be relieved to know.) But I love your discussion of the original novel — and now I kind of want to read the book! Thanks.
Very good book. I listened to it on audio CD and the to hear it read by the “voice” of a little boy enhanced it even more. The subject of the book was so disturbing, I almost didn’t get it, but I’m glad I did.
I read this after I read a blog post about 25% of our genes being patented. Although it is fiction, it is frightening to think of what lengths a pharmaceutical company would go to in an effort to exploit a person’s DNA potential. I very much enjoyed this book.
Bloody evil genocidal murderer and slaver trader is what Christopher Columbus really was !. I fucking hate him !. Why is there an holiday for a guy who brought death, destruction, violence and pain to the Americas ?. So abolish Columbus Day !. Abolish it now !.
I had zero intention of watching The Dictator, but I had never even heard of ZABIBA/H. Thanks for a great review, as well as additional insight into the material! This was a very interesting read.
I can see why publishers would want to raise prices on ebooks. They’re interested in making money. It’s all about business.
I guess the most palatable idea (and none of them are that palatable) of maybe charging a fee for the library to re-purchase books after a certain number of uses.
Yes, of course people don’t necessarily intend to read 3,500 books on their Kindle… There is no “mystery” surrounding that. People just want the ability to choose what they want to read and at any given moment. It’s just like going for a 60 minute walk with 30 hours worth of music on your iPod. Many take their iPod with 30 hours worth of music along anyway. Many people like the luxury of choosing any song they might want to listen to and whenever that desire strikes.
There is definitely an anti-religious bias among the Amazon reviewers. People complain about any Christian content (even if the words “God” or “Jesus” appear in the title–and xxx forbid there should be Christian content without a warning label ahead of time). And if a reviewer dares to defend the religious content of a work, they better be prepared to have their review marked down as “not helpful”.
I’ve just started this book, and this is my first Sigler novel, but I am impressed with his craftsmanship. He doesn’t waste a word, and is keeping me entertained and interested the entire time.
I love that he includes details that make you question the reality of the setting, but spends most of the time entertaining the reader with realistic, well-researched writing!
This is a great read. Have a look at the Guardian article which captures the essence of the book beautifully. I haven’t finished it yet, but I’ve had trouble putting it down!
Thanks for posting. We had a great time at Busboys and Poets. Sheema Kalbasi could not attend. Alyse Knorr poetry editor for So to Speak filled in. Sarah Browning, Siwar Masannat and Alyse lead a discussion on the great things Split this Rock Poetry Festival and So to Speak Feminist Journal are making an impact on poetry in the community. Poetry was shared by the panelist and a spirited open mic closed the program out. The DC poetry scene is alive and well thanks to these great ladies!
Are you acquainted with the Washington Ear? It’s service for the visually impaired that provide oral reading of the Washington Post, USA Today, and excerpts from other publications daily, that listeners can access by phone or by a special radio? I’d be glad to share the information with anyone interested.
Sharon Salus
Keith fans: Will you help support his true graphic novel, “I Was A Teenage Michael Jackson Impersonator!”?Learn more by going to his Kickstarter page. Hurry, your chance ends at 3 pm EST on April 6, 2012!
Loved the book, loved the movie but but as is with so many adaptations was distracted by the deviations. Of course, knowing more of the back story adds to the experience as well, though I’ve told many it’s not necessary to read the book(s) before seeing the movie. Here’s another review that hits on some key points: http://lostangelesblog.wordpress.com/2012/03/26/my-review-of-the-hunger-games/
In certain ways, The Hunger Games glorifies violence, but in other ways, especially through its ending, the filmmakers seem to be glorifying pacifism (don’t worry, no spoilers). All in all, I would recommend seeing The Hunger Games.
In Kieran Shields’ superb new novel, “The Truth of All Things,” brilliant but troubled private detective Perceval Grey is aptly named. Being of mixed American Indian and Caucasian racial heritages, he’s forced to battle deeply ingrained late 19th century New England prejudices, even in his own family. Grey is indeed a gray man in the society he lives and works in — neither an Indian, nor a white man, but straddling some murky, shifting ground in between. At times during an investigation of horrific murders tied to the infamous Salem witch hunts that happened 200 years earlier, Grey’s mixed race is a valuable asset. Mostly, though, Grey finds himself forced to confront an array of bigotries to save the very people who belittle him from an unholy conspiracy that attempts to resurrect in their town’s midst a long-dead evil.
Grey’s mannerisms and methodologies will quickly remind readers of those of his contemporary across the Atlantic, Sherlock Holmes. Grey’s a keenly astute and dispassionate observer, as aware of the facts in front of him as he is of the ones not present that others around him mistakenly presume. Along with his colleagues, Portland Deputy Marshall Archie Lean, Dr. Virgil Steig, and Steig’s niece the local librarian/historian Helen Prescott, Grey scours Maine and its environs for clues both ancient and fresh to stop the murder spree. From the moment a prostitute’s body is found dead late one night in the middle of a massive machine shop, pinned to the ground by a pitchfork thrust through her throat, the detectives’ investigations propel them from churches to brothels to libraries to graveyards to seedy bars to lunatic asylums via foot, trains and hansom cabs. Shields obviously did a lot of painstaking research to do such a great job deftly conveying settings in New England as they were 120 years ago. All of his main characters, good guys and bad, are multidimensional, and they speak in dialogue that’s well written and authentic. In addition to those accomplishments, the book’s plot is a nonstop careening ride from start to finish, crafted with enough breakneck twists and turns to keep readers guessing literally until the story’s very end.
“The Truth of All Things” is one of the best books I’ve read in a while, and I’m happy at its conclusion Shields leaves room for the return of Perceval Grey in a future adventure. Until that sequel comes, mystery and thriller fans will do themselves a big favor treating themselves to this excellent debut work by a very talented new author.
The roots of Christopher Buehlman’s novel, “Those Across the River,” are tangled inextricably in the classic Southern Gothic literary tradition. Emblematic of the best of the genre, Buehlman’s writing is as elegant as it is powerful. Through deft choices of language, idiom, place and pace, he conveys well the cadence of life in the American South at a time the country teetered between the first and second World Wars, the Great Depression raged with seeming immortality, and the American Civil War remained a deep, haunting wound far from healed in formerly Confederate states.
Retreating from Chicago and the professional and personal ruin wrought by their indiscreet adultery, Frank and Eudora alight in Whitbrow, a tiny Georgia town, to take possession of a house willed Frank by his recently deceased aunt. Rejecting his aunt’s warning not to live in her bequest but instead to sell it immediately, Frank and Eudora begin settling in the quaint yellow house, which is separated by a small river and a large forest from his family’s ancestral family plantation. Frank is descended from a notorious Confederate officer who evaded Union bullets only to die brutally at the hands of his own slaves, on his own plantation. In an attempt to right his shattered life both in the aftermath of Chicago, and of his ghastly experiences as a doughboy fighting in bloody French trenches, Frank comes to Whitbrow to explore the remnants of the estate with an eye to writing a definitive history of the plantation and the infamous man who owned it. Yet despite the decades that have passed since the plantation’s demise, it’s not uninhabited. To the contrary, it has been waiting patiently for Frank’s arrival, as have its handful of infernal denizens who smelled Frank and Eudora coming long before they fled Chicago.
Fans of Southern Gothic tales will love “Those Across the River,” as will admirers of shrewd writing. Buehlman’s storytelling is captivating, and unsettling. It’s a very good book.
Look at the people around you. Repeated national surveys say the people you’re looking at dread speaking in public more than flying, illness, terrorism, and even death. Comedian Jerry Seinfeld once summarized the data by quipping, “In other words, at a funeral, the average person would rather be in the casket than giving the eulogy.”
If the notion of speaking in front of any crowd intimidates you, imagine it’s your job to make a paying audience full of expectant strangers ranging from mildly skeptical onlookers to immoderately inebriated hecklers laugh at your jokes. Keep that in mind when treating yourself to author Alan Orloff’s mystery novel, “Killer Routine.” Set mostly in the northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C., “Killer Routine” is the first entry in Orloff’s “Last Laff” series, spotlighting the amateur sleuthing of troubled stand-up comedian and comedy club-owner Channing Hayes. This well-written novel bursts open with the alarming disappearance of Heather Dempsey, Hayes’ protégée (and sister of his late fiancée, Lauren), just before she’s to make her debut appearance at Hayes’ struggling suburban comedy club. Still reeling from Lauren’s untimely death and while battling a hostile takeover attempt aimed at his nightclub, Hayes maneuvers among an escalating pile of lies and murders to find Heather and save her life before she’s victimized in a twisted plot of cold vengeance. This is no funny story, no amusing satire — the book’s tone is dark, as are the natures of many of its principal characters. In addition to spinning a gripping mystery story, “Killer Routine” gives readers a fascinating glimpse into the daunting world inhabited by the men and women who stand alone sweating under piercing floodlights on unforgiving comedy stages the world over, desperately lunging for every laugh they can get.
“Threat Warning” is the third and latest entry in veteran bestselling thriller author John Gilstrap’s series featuring tough-guy hero Jonathan “Digger” Grave. Fans of Gilstrap and Grave will be hard-pressed to put this exhilarating book down before finishing it in a single sitting, as will thriller fans just discovering the author and/or the character. Gilstrap rivets attention from the novel’s electrifying first chapter, and from there the action barrels full tilt right up to the story’s taut climax.
The opening scene explodes with a firefight on the Wilson Bridge during a typical rush hour on a cold November evening in Washington, D.C. The Wilson Bridge onslaught was preceded by one at a shopping mall in Kansas City, and is followed quickly by a bombing at a Detroit middle school as terrorists wage war against the United States on American soil. Meanwhile, before the gun smoke clears from the combat on the bridge, one of the terrorist shooters escapes by carjacking a military wife’s minivan and kidnapping the woman and her teen-aged son, soon delivering them to captivity at the terrorists’ remote compound in rural West Virginia. The price of sparing the hostages’ lives is the immediate withdrawal of all U.S. forces in Afghanistan and the Middle East. Gilstrap keeps the tension mounting relentlessly as the formidable Grave and his small but resourceful team battle to thwart a terrorist sniper plot that threatens to demolish the government and obliterate America’s financial system.
Gilstrap writes well, in a style that’s smart, crisp and engaging. He sets scenes with sufficient detail to put the readers right alongside his characters as heroes and villains clash in both urban and rural settings. He crafts realistic and believable dialogue. Though some of Gilstrap’s characters are a little flat, he earns kudos for avoiding the tendency of many modern thriller writers to sacrifice depth and complexity in even principal characters on the altar of propelling plots. The overall effect is an addictive and satisfying read, and a chilling story that feels disturbingly close to one that might erupt in America at any moment.
As he demonstrates in his absorbing new thriller, “Thick as Thieves,” Peter Spiegelman is a truly gifted writer. His prose is elegant, nuanced and smooth, filled with canny dialogue, shrewd turns of phrase, and intimately insightful descriptions of both place and person. Bestseller lists are replete with serviceable thrillers telling stories that are good enough to hold a reader’s interest sheerly via an uptempo plot and lots of action. The best of the genre, however, captivate not only by crafting an interesting story that’s well-paced, but by writing skillful enough to create an almost visceral feel for the story’s mood every time a reader cracks open the book. “Thick as Thieves” is a stellar example of the latter. It’s impossible to read Spiegelman’s latest novel without palpable feelings of paranoia, betrayal and doom creeping inside you from every page.
Carr is a CIA dropout who subsequently leaves his international private security firm gig by accepting an unexpected invitation to join a small clutch of artful, violent thieves. The group steals huge amounts of money exclusively from the world’s wealthiest malefactors — “drug runners, gun runners, whore runners, human smugglers, kidnappers — the very worst swine.” When the man whose invitation Carr accepted dies in a Chilean gambit gone murderously wrong, Carr’s gifts for meticulous planning, keen observation, and astute foresight propel him to the group’s leadership, although not by unanimous or unwavering acclaim. The next job is to empty the accounts of an international money launderer based in the Grand Cayman. If all goes to plan, that job will be the biggest and last one standing between the group and luxurious retirement. It’s no spoiler to say all does not go to plan.
In addition to being an intense and compelling thriller, at its heart “Thick as Thieves” raises disturbing questions about how real is what seems so clearly true of the people we know best, including the person gazing back at you from your mirror. Spiegelman’s book reminds us that the realities we spend lifetimes carefully constructing around ourselves are very fragile things, and only to the utterly naive is seeing necessarily believing.
Author Gerald Griffin displays noteworthy chops in forging his debut thriller, “Of Good and Evil.” His principal characters are vivid, vibrant and troubled, and sufficiently well-crafted to allow readers to root for them. In lesser hands, that many of the main characters are gifted with varying degrees of paranormal perceptivity might detract from other elements of the story, but that’s not so in this novel. To his credit, Griffin’s handling of those characters’ exceptional abilities is understated rather than bombastic. The book’s plot gallops from start to finish without a dull moment thanks to the author’s excellent sense of pacing. Through lush language and rapt attention to detail, Griffin is particularly adept at setting the scenes in which the characters toil against an array of villains both fictional, and ripped from international headlines. The thriller’s gripping climax pits the main characters in an intense race against dwindling time and unspeakable catastrophe to stop a terrorist sleeper cell from annihilating a major American city. As the title suggests, the entirety of this timely story encourages questioning rote notions of good versus evil, from perspectives personal to geopolitical. I’m looking forward to the sequel.
Matt Richtel, author of the superb novel “Devil’s Plaything,” is a Pulitzer Prize-winning technology reporter for the New York Times. “Devil’s Plaything” is far and away among the very best thrillers released this year. It’s timely, insightful, and disturbingly prescient.
San Francisco in present-day late October is the setting for a breakneck plot twisting around attempts to hijack an elderly woman’s memories under the auspices of a seemingly benign government-sponsored endeavor called the Human Memory Crusade. On its surface, the Crusade is designed to preserve for future generations the life stories of the elderly before dementia or death wipe them from mankind’s record. At a time when mean human life expectancies inexorably rise in virtual lockstep with the ever-increasing onset of material memory impairment among the aged, the Crusade appears a noble pursuit. However, under the untoward influence of potentially sinister multinational neuro-tech companies, quasi-sentient computer software, suspect elder care facilities, shadowy venture capitalists, and even menacing dental offices, the pursuit’s nobility is subject to question.
Richtel tells the story well and almost entirely in first-person, present tense. This gives the novel a breathtaking sense of immediacy, and makes the action insistent and compelling. A mood of deep, gnawing paranoia almost drips from the book’s pages. No one and nothing are as they appear, except when they are, and it’s no easy task for readers to surmise which is which until the novel’s conclusion. Like his crisp dialogue, Richtel’s characters ring true. The author is particularly masterful in presenting the narrator’s elderly grandmother, a principal character who braves the ravages of dementia as she tries to help her grandson navigate multiplying treacheries and deathtraps. Richtel’s portrayal of this unduly tormented old woman is deft, sensitive, accurate, and alone worth reading the novel.
At its core, “Devil’s Plaything” is a story about memory, duality, and the intercourse between the two that pulses in us all. It’s a fantastic thriller, and I can’t recommend it strongly enough.
Michael Crichton’s posthumously published 2006 novel “Pirate Latitudes” is a light and engaging book. Had he the chance to revisit this book before publication, it might have ranked with some of his best work. Sadly, it’s apparent Crichton didn’t get around to polishing the novel prior to his passing, and the book has a makeshift feel. Some of the characters are flat, others are merely stereotypical of the swashbuckler genre. Only a few of them have sufficient meat on their bones to hold the reader’s attention and care. The plot sails quickly, but it’s burdened with a bit too much prosaic piratical ballast that Crichton likely would have refined, if not deleted entirely, upon rewrite. Nonetheless, Crichton was a great storyteller and a skilled writer, and particularly for his admirers, the book’s worth reading. I recommend doing so while reclining on a sunny shore, with warm sand trickling between your toes, and a vast expanse of deep blue sea stretching before you to a distant, cloudless horizon. “Pirate Latitudes” is a good beach read, but no more memorable than that.
Whether as man or myth, arguably no one since Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. has more profoundly affected American daily life than Osama bin Laden. As author Michael Scheuer argues cogently in his new biography of bin Laden, since his formal declaration of war against the United States in 1996, bin Laden has deliberately drawn America into armed conflicts of varying durations but substantial costs in Africa, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Since past is present’s prologue, likely bin Laden will goad further American military action in the turmoils currently roiling north Africa and the Middle East. Using a plethora of authoritative sources, including most importantly the words and writings of bin Laden himself, Scheuer demonstrates that bin Laden attempts these manipulations to lure America into ruinous wars where victory is ever elusive but the prolonged loss of American blood and treasure is assured. In this concise and well-written book, former chief of the CIA’s bin Laden unit Scheuer presents a compelling argument that American political, military and media leaders are engaged in mortal combat with a fabricated enemy of their own creation and preference, instead of with bin Laden himself. Scheuer’s book is a valiant effort to present bin Laden the man, rather than the phantasm he’s become in many American minds. Only when America understands the man and his true motives, strengths and limitations, says Scheuer, can America engage and defeat bin Laden in realistic and definitive terms. As America finds itself mired in the second decade of a multi-front Al Qaeda War bin Laden began during the Clinton administration, Scheuer’s book should be mandatory reading both for anyone curious why this war rages on without seeming end, and for American politicians and generals eager to fight the enemy they have, rather than the one they imagine.
(Note: this review was first written and posted less than a day before bin Laden’s death. Timing is everything.)
That author Raymond Khoury is an excellent storyteller is no surprise. He has demonstrated his skills in this regard amply over the course of the three novels he released prior to his latest one, “The Templar Salvation.” What surprises about “The Templar Salvation” is that it’s even better than the immensely enjoyable novel to which it’s a sequel, “The Last Templar.”
“The Templar Salvation” mesmerizes for a variety of reasons, but it’s difficult to list any of them above the intricate historical, geographical, and sociocultural research he weaves together to create the vivid settings where his characters toil. Khoury is masterful at imbibing his story with richness of time and place both ancient and modern, inviting all his readers’ senses to experience the ceaseless action and twisting plot right along with the characters.
“The Templar Salvation” also treats readers to Khoury’s magnificent pacing. He puts readers in the rare and enviable position of requiring gargantuan effort to stop turning the pages before the novel’s end.
Khoury’s writing is frequently and favorably associated with the best work of the estimable Dan Brown and Steve Berry. “The Templar Salvation” lands Khoury squarely among the ranks of today’s preeminent thriller authors, and calls to mind the writing of Lee Child, Vince Flynn, and David Baldacci.
The title of Stephen Haycox’ book is slightly misleading, as the first half of the work details imperial Russia’s “discovery,” exploration and exploitation of Alaska before selling the massive territory to America in 1867 for $7.2 million (about two cents an acre). The book is a brief and interesting primer on Alaskan history from the middle of the 18th century to the dawn of the 21st. Haycox concentrates on sociocultural conflicts between natives and incomers; interminable discord between environmentalists and industrialists; and since statehood in 1959, strife between competing native, state, and federal sovereignty claims over land and resources. Particularly in the first half of the book, Haycox occasionally obsesses with minutia better left to a lengthier examination. Nonetheless, this is a good and well-written introduction to Alaskan history, including an ample bibliography for readers interested in learning more about America’s “Last Frontier.
Editor Peter Haining does a good job choosing the selections for this collection of ghost stories. Rather than emphasizing pieces featuring moaning phantoms, clanking chains and other staple but simplistic fare common to the genre, Haining sought stories heavy with eerie mood and tone. As with any anthology like this one, some vignettes are better or more effective than others. That said, the overall quality of the selections is consistently high. Some of the tales surely will curdle a reader’s blood late in the dead of a stormy night. The compilation makes clear ghosts are as often specters within us as without, and there can be no haunting absent the haunted.
It’s easy to shrug off this novel as a funny book about the most famous and influential rock band of all time. Look deeper. You’ll see scribe Alan Goldsher veils stunning truth behind humorous fiction in his tome, “Paul Is Undead.”
Were three of the Beatles really zombies? Before shaking your head no, examine the connection between the band and author Edgar Allan Poe. In his immortal 1967 song “I Am the Walrus,” John Lennon cries out, “Man you should have seen them kicking Edgar Allan Poe.” Less renowned but no less pertinent is Paul McCartney’s shout-out to Poe in his 1968 song unreleased by the Beatles, “Thingumybob.” This tune’s title is a blatant reference to Poe’s “The Literary Life of Thingum Bob, Esq.” Combine these unassailable facts with Poe’s most famous tale, “The Fall of the House of Usher,” noted as “the basis of zombie mythology in modern pop culture” (see [...]), and one conclusion alone raises its rotting head: Goldsher is dancing around shrouded truths, not beguiling lies. In the Beatles-Poe nexus, Poe was the legendary “Fifth Beatle” who ushered the band in all things zombie.
Still unconvinced the Beatles were zombies? Find a vinyl copy of the band’s 1966 album “Revolver.” Play the song “She Said She Said” forwards on a standard turntable at precisely 33 and 1/3 RPM, and confession emerges clear as day to the astute listener: “I know what it’s like to be dead.” Kudos to Goldsher for venturing where no Beatleologist before him dared.
That said, no way Ringo’s a ninja. That’s just silly.
Wilkie Collins’ “The Moonstone,” an epistolary mystery story published in 1868, often is cited as one of the first, if not the first, detective novels ever written. No less a literary luminary than T.S. Eliot attributed to Collins the “invention” of the detective novel genre. “The Moonstone” is certainly an excellent mystery story, featuring what would become staples of classic Western detective fiction — an amateur detective, a renown professional investigator, incompetent policemen, multiple false leads and red herrings, and an “inside job.” It’s also subtly laced with social commentary about class, race, sexuality, religious evangelism and substance abuse in Victorian England during a period when the British Empire ruled about a quarter of the world’s population. For anyone interested in the genesis and evolution of the modern socially conscious detective novel, “The Moonstone” is impossible to ignore.
On Amazon alone as of today, there are more than 2,900 reviews of Dan Brown’s latest novel, “The Lost Symbol,” so there’s little need for another one covering the book’s entirety. Brown has written better books, and worse. Overall this one is an entertaining but uneven diversion with a fairly preachy exhortation at its end.
The most compelling element in “The Lost Symbol” is the antagonist Mal’akh. I’ve read all Brown’s novels, and consistently have found the vast majority of the characters populating them uniformly flat and two-dimensional. Not so with Mal’akh. (In modern Hebrew, mal’akh is the general word for “angel.”) Brown does a great job endowing this character with dimension, depth, pain, and even a touch of pathos. Of all the characters Brown has created for his novels, Mal’akh is by far the most interesting; more interesting even, dare I say, than the redoubtable Robert Langdon himself.
For purposes of his workmanlike study of the impact of so-called alternative spiritualism on American society over the past two hundred odd years, author Mitch Horowitz defines American occultism as an enterprise embracing a multitude of “mystical philosophies and mythical lore, particularly the belief in an `unseen world’ whose forces act upon us and through us.” In Horowitz’ view, American (as opposed to European) occultism largely has been a crusade for personal self-improvement and beneficent individual empowerment through the good offices of self-anointed seers and dead but altruistic ancestors. He traces the development of this alleged movement from the arrival in New York of a British Shaker named Mother Ann Lee in 1774, through the New Age beliefs and practices popularized during the 1960′s and reverberating to the present day. Horowitz’ argument hinges on his self-serving definition of what he deems a particularly American brand of occultism that is both scatter-shot in its inclusion of virtually any feel-good unorthodox pietism and generally rigid in its exclusion of the more sinister bypasses on the American esoteric highway. It’s an intriguing and informative read, but the subject Horowitz surveys is far more intricately nuanced than his book concedes.
Author Brad Meltzer’s effort to wrench a thriller from interpolating the Biblical tale of Cain and Abel with the death of the father of Superman’s creator is strained, at best. The story plods slowly, stuffed with highly unlikely coincidences in an attempt to justify the plot’s unsatisfying resolution. It’s rendered jagged by too much clumsy dialogue, a gaggle of flat and unnecessary stock characters, a painfully obvious villain, and constant switches in narrative mode from first to third person for no readily apparent reason. The premise of this inept novel is interesting, and in spots Meltzer writes with breezy ease and commendable fluidity, though far from frequently enough to raise this book to the level of his better work.
Some of Raymond Khoury’s engaging thriller, “The Sign,” focus attention on Khoury’s alleged attacks on certain political and/or religious beliefs they assume he belittles. I see the novel as something other and more abstract than mere vilification of George W. Bush, religion, or global warming skeptics.
“The Sign” examines the power of iconography and symbology in a conflicted world teeming with deeply held and seemingly irreconcilable political, bureaucratic, religious and sociocultural ideologies. The thematic battle in the story is only superficially between one set of believers and another. Rather, the true battle over the sign in the sky is within the reader. All of us respond to various symbols one way or another, more often than not in a Pavlovian manner inculcated in us since birth by self-interested forces far beyond our control. “The Sign” encourages us to scrutinize the origins and mythoi underpinning each icon, symbol and sign we encounter. It urges us to contemplate how, by whom, and to what end such powerful images are used all around us, every day.
Khoury’s message in “The Sign” is important and thought-provoking, and it’s presented in a story well told. Khoury is adept at bringing settings exotic or ordinary to life. The action is crisp and clean, as befits an author skilled at screenwriting. The dialogue rings true, in that it reads the way people actually talk to one another. The characters are intriguingly duplicitous, realistically flawed, and struggle to varying degrees to contain or exploit their own and each others’ rapacities.
It’s a very good book. I had fun reading it and thinking about it, and I recommend it.
Set largely in and around Los Angeles in 1969 and 1970, and told in the form of a psychedelic (as opposed to noir) detective story, plot is far from the point of Thomas Pynchon’s novel, “Inherent Vice.” The plot is disjointed, but then so were the times during which the story unfolds. Rather, the novel presents a pastiche of a post-Altamont and Manson-obsessed slice of America, when the hippie culture was quickly self-destructing, shortly to be eclipsed by Watergate, disco and polyester. Pynchon does a superb job capturing and conveying that milieu through a wide array of distinctive characters who pop in and out of the story, each presenting through their respective mannerisms in speech, conduct, dress and philosophy a unique perspective on the unkept promises of the so-called Age of Aquarius. The book’s title is a legal term referring to a thing that has inextricably in its very nature a covert flaw that renders the thing’s deterioration inevitable. In this novel, the thing in question is the heyday of the American hippie. As Pynchon was there to witness the fall, his work provides a meaningful vista of a particularly American time and place not so very long ago.
Like the waters of Key Biscayne, in and near where much of the plot of this book occurs, this story is choppy. That’s to be expected, given the novel consists of 13 chapters, no two written by the same author. Dave Barry kicks off the story, Carl Hiaasen finishes it, and the writers in between are all seasoned Floridian authors of varying renown. Some of the chapters are funnier than others, some better written, and a couple don’t work at all. The approach makes for disjointed storytelling at best, and reads more like a series of tenuously interconnected vignettes than an actual story. It’s an interesting writing experiment, but one that’s been done before and better. If you’re a fan of any of these authors or the peculiar inanities of south Florida life, you’ll enjoy this book.
I enjoyed Khoury’s first novel, “The Last Templar.” Khoury’s considerable screenwriting talents drove the plot, making the story play like a movie inside my head as I read it. As he has mentioned in numerous interviews, Khoury originally created “The Last Templar” as a screenplay, and the book was accordingly cinematic from beginning to end.
Good as “Templar” is, Khoury’s second novel, “The Sanctuary,” is far richer. In “Sanctuary” we find Khoury maturing as a true novelist, rather than a screenwriter. The characters in “Sanctuary” are not created for the screen, but for the page. They are deeper, more nuanced, and most interestingly, more flawed than the ones in “Templar.” The “Sanctuary” characters are as multifaceted, and at times as unpredictable, as Beirut, the fascinating city in which much of the story occurs. Beirut itself, a city where what one feels is often incongruent with what one sees, is as much a character as the people Khoury propels through the enthralling action in “Sanctuary.” The city mirrors the characters’ individual struggles to balance hope and despair, joy and terror, survival and destruction.
The most compelling aspect of the novel is its theme, urging us to assess not only the benefits, but the consequences and responsibilities of living lives much longer than those afforded us by current actuarial tables. The novel wisely suggests our instinctive desire for materially extended lifespans be contemplated with as much focus on the qualitative as on the quantitative. It may not be so axiomatic whoever breathes longest, breathes best.
“The Sanctuary” is a very entertaining novel, by a very astute novelist. It’s the best novel I’ve read this year (2007). I recommend it highly.
The lengthy title and subtitle of Arthur Goldwag’s book, “Cults, Conspiracies, and Secret Societies: The Straight Scoop on Freemasons, The Illuminati, Skull and Bones, Black Helicopters, The New World Order, and many, many more,” belies the brevity with which he addresses most of the myriad subjects between the book’s covers. It’s true even a mildly avid researcher can find on the Internet or in a public library or well-stocked bookstore vast amounts of exhaustively detailed material devoted to each of the subjects Goldwag surveys in his book. This is the advantage, rather than disadvantage, of Goldwag’s approach. Goldwag’s book supplies only the tantalizing breadcrumbs. He leaves it for the reader to follow the trail if she’s hungry to find more information on the matters that interest her, many of which she may never had known of before exploring Goldwag’s work. Goldwag’s writing is savvy, crisp and clean, often tongue-in-cheek, and he’s not afraid to voice his personal opinion on some of the wackier Cults, Conspiracies, and Secret Societies featured in his book. It’s a quick, informative and entertaining read, which I believe is exactly what the author intended.
Austin Camacho’s book, Successfully Marketing Your Novel in the 21st Century, is a crucial reference for any novelist seeking a firm grasp of fundamental principles and techniques necessary to get and keep his or her work in the public eye. The 22 chapters in Camacho’s book provide sensible and practical guidance for both the nascent and the more experienced novelist. The book covers a wide array of subjects, including everything from physical (and electronic) book production and distribution to creating memorable marketing materials on and off the Internet to the importance of exploiting “nontraditional” promotional and sales opportunities. It’s a highly informative book, fun to read and think about, and it’s written with warmth, wit and charm. I recommend it strongly.
David Gibbins’ novel, The Tiger Warrior, reveals the author is an intelligent, educated and worldly man. The novel brims with historical and archaeological facts and theories spanning in time and place from the birth of the unified Chinese empire in 221 BCE to Caesarean Rome to British colonial rule on the Indian subcontinent to present day Afghanistan. Most of these facts and hypotheses are intriguing, and all are patently the result of Gibbins’ commendably deep research, study and thought.
Unfortunately, none of the above renders Gibbins a master of character, dialogue, or narrative pacing in the art of storytelling. With rare exceptions, his characters are uniformly dull. These characters do not converse with each other so much as they lecture at one another. They often speak for hundreds of words at a time in single stultifying paragraphs that frequently fill more than an entire page before being subjected to an equally bloviated and professorial response. Real people do not talk this way, and wading through lecture after lecture churned out by one flat character after another makes for tedious reading and slows the story to a crawl.
Had Gibbins paid as much attention to character and dialogue as he did to his excellent research, this book would be enjoyable, rather than merely informative. He did not, and accordingly the novel reads far more like a textbook than a good story told well.
This book is a passably entertaining foray into steampunk and a good way to while away a few hours. The principal characters, Maurice Newbury and Victoria Hobbes, are shamelessly modeled on Arthur Conan Doyle’s iconic Holmes and Watson, and they’re even more blatantly reminiscent of the X Files’ Mulder and Scully. The plot moves quickly as the heroes grapple under unreliable gaslight with an array of zombies, robots, and human miscreants in Victorian London at the seemingly incessantly foggy dawn of the 20th century. The story is engaging enough, and often summons compelling imagery. To his credit, author George Mann does a fairly good job bringing most of the handful of main characters to life.
The book cries for the touch of a voracious editor. Mann spends too much energy hammering home via overwrought symbolism the dehumanizing socioeconomic upheavals foisted on England as inevitable end products of Britain’s rampant imperialism and industrialization. There are a couple of insubstantial subplots adding little but extra pages to the story. I suspect Mann included them to introduce characters for future novels. Mann has problems with points of view, switching haphazardly from one to another. Toward the story’s end Newbury battles in quick succession a pair of zombies, then a pair of robots, then a serial killer on the roof of a train, and finally in a zeppelin against the evil mastermind, defeating them all with a brand of superheroism that reduces the likes of James Bond to effete incompetence. The last couple of chapters, and the epilogue, exist solely to ensure the reader knows all too well Mann has every intention of writing the further adventures of Newbury and Hobbes. With strong editing, those adventures may well be worth reading.
Cats are said to have nine lives because they’re popularly purported to be more tenacious of life than most animals. Dan Baum titled his excellent book “Nine Lives” both because it details the pre- and post-Katrina true stories of nine very disparate New Orleanians, and as a tribute to a city that clings to life with feline tenacity despite powerful forces continually arrayed against its survival. In the face of impending if not inevitable disasters repeatedly flung at the city by nature or man, the people of New Orleans refuse to let their city die. This is a very good thing, as New Orleans is the only major American city where the philosophy of “laissez faire” refers not merely to economic liberalism, but to a way of life riveted to joys other than those that can be measured most readily in minutes and money.
Baum writes well and clearly, in a succinct and fairly journalistic style. The nine people he chooses to follow before and after Katrina are interesting, and in recounting their stories they reveal as much about the kaleidoscopic city they love as they do their tragedies and triumphs in it. Baum’s storytelling technique can get a bit choppy as he intersperses the nine stories together over 40 years, switching from one to another. After the first few chapters I chose to read the book by character, rather than in order of pagination.
Baum’s book Nine Lives is enlightening, entertaining, and moving. It’s a stirring epistle to and from a great American city and its people. I recommend it.
I enjoyed this book very much. The story is well-paced, the plot twists and turns engagingly, and the characters are sufficiently motivated to propel the action to its conclusion. I appreciated how Khoury allowed the two principal characters to examine their religious and spiritual beliefs during the course of the story, questioning and scrutinizing their respective belief structures. That the belief system in question in “The Last Templar” is Christianity generally, and Roman Catholicism specifically, I found irrelevant. The characters’ scrutinization of their attitudes towards faith applies as well to any faith-based belief structure, whether religious, sociocultural, or political. The story urges reflection about any belief unquestioningly accepted or rejected.
Regardless of its philosophical underpinnings, it’s a great story, brimming with action and suspense, set in a variety of exotic locales, and it’s a lot of fun to read. I understand it’s being developed as a miniseries. If the producers and directors do it justice, it will be a lot of fun to watch, too.
Although those old enough to remember the 1986 World Series may feel differently, many deem the September collapse of the 2011 Boston Red Sox as the worst flop in the history of Major League Baseball. As recently as August of 2011, smart money in Las Vegas put the chances of the Red Sox making the post-season at 99.4%. The Red Sox proved Vegas wrong by utterly blowing the nine game lead the team enjoyed in the American League Wild Card race in early September. Tony Francona fell on his sword and stepped down as Red Sox manager a couple days after the season’s disastrous end, emphasizing among other ailments that derailed the team’s seemingly assured playoff appearance a locker room teeming with strife and dissension among the players. But author Glenn Stout’s excellent new book, “Fenway 1912,” gives the lie to the notion that locker room ego clashes preclude championship play on the diamond.
As intimated by its subtitle, Stout’s book covers far more than player discord during the 1912 season. Fenway’s inaugural season was marked by virtually incessant tumult — terrible weather; greedy baseball executives; labor unrest; professional gamblers; Boston politics; architectural slapdash; ornery fans and religious intolerance. Each and all of these demanded heavy tolls from the team during a baseball season book-ended by the Titanic’s sinking and an attempted assassination of Progressive Party presidential candidate (and former president) Theodore Roosevelt. Given that virtually anyone who personally witnessed Fenway’s erection and its first World Series isn’t alive anymore, Stout does a superb job sifting through masses of contemporaneous historical records to unveil not only the intricacies of building the park and the team that played in it, but also to imbue the book with a sense of the turbulent social, cultural, political and economic forces roiling America 100 years ago. In that way, “Fenway 1912″ appeals more broadly than to only fans of the Boston Red Sox, or of professional baseball. Stout conveys very well a small slice of Americana at a time when the country was undergoing fundamental sociopolitical changes culminated by Woodrow Wilson’s winning a ferocious four-party presidential election while the tinder of World War I caught fire in the Balkans.
Before spring training’s first pitch the 2011 Red Sox were widely considered a lock to make the post-season, if not win the World Series. Presumably the October 11, 2011 release date for “Fenway 1912″ was intended to coincide with the team’s predicted march to championship glory. It would be a shame if the team’s premature demise dowsed interest in Stout’s outstanding new book. The 1912 Boston Red Sox were a team ridden with religious and other schisms so intractable bloody fistfights broke out in their locker room during the World Series they won. Against this backdrop, Stout’s book is instructive in making abundantly (though unintentionally) clear that pinning the 2011 team’s failure on a vastly pettier brand of interpersonal friction than what rocked Fenway throughout 1912 rings hollow. Good history is illuminative that way.
There’s nothing particularly subtle or intricate about J. Gregory Smith’s competent new novel, “A Noble Cause.” It’s a straightforward modern thriller, unburdened by complexity. With the exception of one secondary character, all of the principals and secondaries who toil in Smith’s story are either plainly good, or plainly bad, and none of them are very deep. Smith’s settings won’t take readers anywhere they’ve not visited before courtesy of dozens of other novelists in scores of other novels. Still, Smith writes fairly snappy and realistic dialogue, his points of view are consistent, and he paces this novel well enough to keep the pages turning. It’s a solid thriller, written with skill sufficient to hold readers’ attention and keep them entertained.
In the aftermath of his girlfriend’s Antiguan disappearance and the murders of his parents in Pennsylvania, Mark Noble battles to uncover the reasons and people behind the mysterious kidnapping and deaths. The plot rushes along a track centered around clandestine mind control experiments conducted on unwitting subjects via pharmaceutically-enhanced hypnosis. Accordingly, the back-cover copy of Smith’s book likens “A Noble Cause” to Richard Condon’s famous 1959 novel, “The Manchurian Candidate.” In that the latter was as much socio-political Cold War commentary as thriller, while Smith’s work has no such grand political or philosophical ambitions, the comparison is at best a stretch. Nonetheless, “A Noble cause” is a rewarding read, and a good way to while away a few hours.
Few cities’ annals fascinate the way the long, colorful history of New Orleans does. While there’s no shortage of books old or recent detailing New Orleans’ twisting, twisted chronicles over the past three centuries, readers interested in the city’s eerier side will find much to delight in author Troy Taylor’s brief but entertaining book, “Haunted New Orleans.” Over the course of 12 chapters in less than 130 pages, Taylor tells some of New Orleans’ most famous and infamous ghost stories, and he tells them well. A lot of this material is available in greater detail in other books, but to his credit Taylor does a fine job of introducing tales that for countless years have made the flesh of both the city’s residents and its visitors shiver. “Haunted New Orleans” is a solid, informative and often spine-tingling primer for people intrigued by the macabre things that rise up to crawl and creep when sunlight surrenders to nightfall in The Big Easy.
I’ve navigated thousands of streets in scores of cities round the world, only rarely stopping to ponder much how those street names have to say about their cities’ stories, whether glorious or sordid. Nowadays many of us traverse modern cities cut into neat blocks by roads efficiently but boringly designated chiefly by numbers and letters, or states and presidents. (As in, “I’ll meet you at the corner of 32nd and U, not Virginia and Jefferson.”) Especially for those people, John Chases’ book “Frenchmen, Desire, Good Children” will make you wish your city elders had the good sense to christen such tepidly named streets instead in honor of the famous or infamous folks who first founded your cities back when the roads weren’t more than well-trod ruts in the dirt. Chase’s book unveils the long and twisted history of New Orleans by revealing how its streets came to bear the names they do. For anyone who has wandered the serpentine thoroughfares and alleyways of New Orleans, or who wonders what forgotten tales the more singular street names of their own cities may tell, “Frenchmen, Desire, Good Children” is an enlightening and very entertaining read.
Can something as mundane as a hand accidentally slammed in a car door derail an eminent United States senator’s promising presidential prospects? In Alan Glynn’s new international thriller, “Bloodland,” it might do so just as readily as the mysterious helicopter crash off Ireland’s coast years earlier that killed a coked-up young Hollywood trollop at the peak of her notoriety. Without a steady job in hand or on the horizon, young journalist Jimmy Gilroy reluctantly finds himself freelancing on spec to write a biography of the famously dead starlet. The vapid celebrity expose he dreads writing becomes something vastly more dreadful as finds himself delving into a savage conspiracy that sucks him into an increasingly menacing labyrinth of lies and corpses reaching from the depths of war torn African jungles to the steps of the White House.
Though it takes a little while to get off the ground, Glynn’s novel is a worthy read for conspiracy thriller fans. The Great Recession’s rapacious specters loom in the book’s background as Glynn deftly weaves spiraling plot lines teeming with twisted characters, all of whom are intriguingly flawed and none of whom are particularly loveable. The dialogue is crisp, and thanks to Glynn’s fastidious research the settings ring both exotic and true. As with many of the best modern thrillers, a real-life story chillingly similar to the tale Glynn spins in “Bloodland” could be the breathless headlines on tomorrow’s news.
Most novelists with robust sales in their rear view mirror stick rigidly to the tried-and-true format that earned them their past successes. In the highly competitive arena that is modern fiction book publishing there’s nothing inherently wrong with a writer clinging tightly to formula, particularly when that formula has resonated with readers and the people cutting his royalty checks. It happens all the time. So it’s both noteworthy and laudable when an author with Raymond Khoury’s estimable track record not only probes a new path, but does it with a result as satisfying and enjoyable as his new thriller, “The Devil’s Elixir.”
Khoury burst onto international bestseller lists in 2006 with his blockbuster novel, “The Last Templar.” “The Last Templar” and the three books that followed it have been translated into dozens of languages, and have charted in scores of countries. If any bestselling novelist could rest on his stylistic laurels and adhere to formula, it’s Khoury. Kudos to him for choosing instead to present something a little different in his latest release. For the legions of ardent fans of Reilly and Tess there are no worries, because the engaging duo are back in “The Devil’s Elixir.” However, in this breakneck thriller the whirlwind plot (excepting the prologue) unfolds entirely in the present day, as opposed to interweaving with a historical adventure as in Khoury’s previous works. And while Khoury’s prose gets better and more engaging with every book, with this release admirably continuing that trend, for the first time in any of his novels Khoury elected to write a large part of the book in (Reilly’s) first-person narrative. Given his prior triumphs, Khoury certainly didn’t have to craft the book that way. That he did speaks well for him spreading his wings as a writer, and also enhances the immediacy and impact of the story for readers. Yet while exploring narrative techniques unprecedented in his earlier books, Khoury still delivers what his fans have rightfully come to expect — a gripping plot with astonishing twists, consistently alluring protagonists, and a really nasty villain who earns his menacing epithet, El Brujo (“The Sorcerer”), many times over during the novel’s course.
This is Khoury’s best book to date. It will please his steadfast fans, and it will gain him many new ones.
As our economy continues to wheeze slowly along (what we hope is) its road to recovery in The Great Recession’s tumultuous aftermath, James Grippando has written a new thriller that gives pause to conventional thought about what laid beneath one of the most brutal financial crimes of recent times. The story’s starting point is clearly inspired by Bernie Madoff’s felonious scam that’s commonly considered the biggest financial fraud in American history. In the stand-alone book “Need You Now,” however, it doesn’t take Grippando long to veer sharply from Madoffian dogma and offer for consideration that motivations other than pedestrian self-enrichment can underpin swindles like Madoff’s.
In the enthralling style for which Grippando has become very popular, “Need You Now” tells the story of Patrick Lloyd. Lloyd is a young financial advisor who, with his enigmatic girlfriend Lilly Scanlon, risk all to expose a deadly $60 billion ponzi conspiracy that oozes from Wall Street’s gleaming skyscrapers to sleek, shiny Singapore, to dangerous Paraguayan no-man’s-land, and far into the dark heart of Washington, D.C. Appropriately enough given the deliberate complexity of financial chicanery like Madoff’s that spans both many years and great distances, this is no elementary A to B to C linear mystery tale. Instead, Grippando successfully intertwines a labyrinth of intriguing (and sometimes seemingly incongruous) plot lines to create a story that’s immediate and timely, and as disturbing as it is engrossing. His protagonists are sympathetic and very human characters, refreshingly unlike the quasi-superhumans who frequently overpopulate modern thrillers. Grippando also does a great job of evoking a true sense of place for his settings. For example, in addition to aptly setting stages around various Manhattan hallmarks that are well known from scads of other books set in New York, he deftly captures and conveys less renown places like the Lemon Ice King of Corona, and “spaghetti park,” in Queens. That kind of care for detail is emblematic of all Grippando’s work in “Need You Now,” and is only one of many reasons this very enjoyable thriller is well worth reading.
After reading “Living Proof,” it’s clear debut author Kira Peikoff has no fear of jumping into controversy. Peikoff’s book is a well-written and compelling thriller that boldly examines some of the most contentious medical, legal and philosophical issues confronting us today. Arianna Drake, a brilliant young doctor specializing in infertility treatment, runs a clinic that attracts unwanted and potentially catastrophic scrutiny from the U.S. Department of Embryo Preservation. Trent Rowe, the DEP agent tasked to gather evidence sufficient to shut down Drake’s clinic and end her career with imprisonment, instead finds himself allured by Drake despite her past radicalism, and the illness that threatens to take her life very soon. The more Rowe learns about Drake’s life and her illegal but miraculous work, the less sure he is of things he took for granted before meeting her. With lives and an unprecedented medical breakthrough on the line, Drake and Rowe find themselves racing time and facing danger, ruin and death against the backdrop of one of today’s prevalent sociocultural conflicts. The story’s set 15 years from now, but Peikoff’s plot could spring from fiction to fact far sooner than that.
I travel often, and one of the best ways I’ve found to get a quick survey of a city new to me is to read up on its local ghost stories. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a “believer” or not in ghostly things — a town’s popular ghost stories reveal much about the place and its people, and how they came to be the way they are when you finally get to meet them. In “Haunted Savannah,” author (and Savannah tour guide) John Caskey has assembled an enlightening and very entertaining collection of Savannah lore. The dozens of stories in this book provide a brief but fascinating overview of Savannah’s nearly 300 years of singular history. In keeping with its title, the vast majority of the stories are of the ghost variety, but the book also features several tales of local strangeness arising from plain eccentric behavior rather than other-worldliness. The book’s final few pages give thumbnail descriptions of each of Savannah’s famous 24 city Squares. The book would benefit greatly from some copyediting, but it serves well as a useful and fun introduction to a captivating American city.
“Three Stations” is author Martin Cruz Smith’s latest installment featuring Russian prosecutorial investigator Arkady Renko, though it’s not the greatest. That honor remains firmly in the grip of Smith’s exceptional 1981 thriller “Gorky Park,” which first introduced Renko to the literary world. “Three Stations” is the seventh novel in the Renko series. Smith wasn’t quite 40 years old when “Gorky Park” came out, and the Soviet Union still had a decade of life left in it. Smith was nearly nearly 70 when “Three Stations” was published in 2010, by which time the Soviet Union that Smith and Renko grew up with had been dead and gone for almost 20 years.
Or had it? As he has with all the novels in his Renko series, Smith artfully imbues the stories and the characters that fill them with a certain brand of uniquely vodka-drenched Russian discontent and world-weariness that has thrived unabated for generations. It’s clear Smith and Renko see Russia’s current sociopolitical and economic oligarchical hierarchy as fundamentally far more the same than different from its Soviet and Tsarist predecessors in all but name.
The plot in “Three Stations” is straightforward, anchored to a rural teenage prostitute named Maya’s frantic search for her stolen baby in the bleak and dangerous Moscow neighborhood from which the novel takes its name, while Renko tracks a serial killer of young women. The book directs at least as much focus on Maya’s travails as on Renko’s, which has disappointed some of this book’s reviewers. That said, it’s clear the principal character in “Three Stations” isn’t Maya, or even Renko, so much as it is present-day Moscow. Viewed from that perspective, “Three Stations” is a very good book; Smith’s eye for detail and his talent for unveiling the crushing and seemingly insurmountable disparities between Moscow’s privileged elite and downtrodden masses are no less sharp than they were in “Gorky Park.” Smith’s deft touch with dialogue, in particular, is just as brilliant as it has ever been in succinctly conveying modern Muscovites’ daily tribulations. Moscow is a massive city of 11.5 million people that lately finds itself drowning in cash wrenched as much via the country’s deeply imbedded corruption and criminality as from rampant exploitation of Russia’s vast natural resources. The brutish effects of that money’s savagely inequitable distribution inflame the novel’s every page. Russia is a very old country, and whether ruled by Tsar, Secretary General, or President, Smith’s premise is that Russia’s internal monologue has stayed remarkably unchanged in many ways for many centuries.
Though it’s not hard to tell both author and character have grown somewhat tired in the past 30 years, nevertheless they’ve done so gracefully. Fans of Smith and Renko, and those who find modern Russia fascinating, will appreciate “Three Stations” as a knowledgeable thriller author’s newest postcard from an unvarnished Moscow.
P&P is in my neighborhood. Our move to DC coincided with P&P’s opening in 1984, and it has been a mainstay in my life. My book club is registered, thus giving us a nice 20% discount, and I’ve enjoyed numerous hours browsing in the store and eating or grabbing a coffee in the coffee shop, alone and with friends.
Interesting. I like that you included the detail about the “Mrs. Clooney” shirt. That makes me think of how Bridget Jones is crazy about Colin Firth in the book and he appears playing a character in the movie.
My daughter loves your books and passes them on to me. I believe we have read all of them.
If you are ever in Chicago we would love to have you for dinner. You would have to do most of the talking. Telling us all the interesting things about your life.
I hope my daughter reads your new book quickly.
Best regards.
Thanks for the attention to online audio drama! It’s really quite phenomenal how the medium is reviving thanks to the internet. Readers may be thrilled to know there is a wealth of resources out there, over 200 hours of free downloads for all contemporary material is available through podcasts like Radio Drama Revival http://www.radiodramarevival.com and the Sonic Society http://sonicsociety.org/ which showcase new work each week. A lot of phenomenal “indie” audio drama awaits your ears!
What disturbs me is that The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels is dilcuned as the 100 Classic books pre-loaded (at least by Chapters/Indigo in Canada.). Communism has killed at least 130 million people so far. 10% of all Canadians are refugees from Communism or the descendents of refugees from Communism. Tell the Chapters / Indigo bookstore monopoly you are not interested in buying mandatory Communism with your e-book reader!
Thanks, Smog and Teen. Encyclopedia Dramatica is good at encapsulating my enflieg of anxiety about the internet. I remember reading an article about Anonymous in Rolling Stone or something a few years ago and actually being more confused by it. Favorite quotes: Truly Epic Lulz, Like an internet hate machine
I am glad I borrowed this book from the libarry instead of paying $ to buy it. We have a merchant store on Amazon for 4 years. This book has not told me anything that I didn’t know. I finished the book in 3 hours, granted I skimmed through a lot of it because I already knew the stuff. But it sounds more like an advertising for Amazon as it keeps talking about these sucessful Amazon sellers. Well, I wonder how many of them actually compete head on with Amazon. They talked about a seller saying that it is not a problem competing with Amazon and don’t think Amazon will drive them out of business. But they don’t tell you the truth!! If Amazon gets into a product, they get the buy box almost 95% of the time even if they are not the lowest price seller. Then of course the book didn’t talk about how ruthless Amazon is in driving out competition, that they will match the lowest price of any seller (may be except for the book category) before shipping, instead of the overall price. We have in our experience seen Amazon sell an item cheaper than wholesale cost, and we called the supplier and verified that the price they sell to Amazon is indeed higher than what Amazon is selling at. In other words, Amazon is the 10,000 lb gorilla that will squash the competition even by losing money on the sale because Amazon can afford to. Therefore, if you are a new seller and want to get into selling on Amazon as a business, don’t let this book fool you thinking that it is easy as long as you have great customer services. It also don’t tell you that A-Z guarantee is always on the side of buyer no matter what form of confirmation you have. All in all, this book is for someone with no experience selling on Amazon at all. The only thing I found useful was just some tips on marketing.
Amazon has a tremendous meinatrkg operation based on excellent service and a valuable service: reader reviews. Oh, there is the occasional inaccurate review, but Amazon reviewers are rabid about letting a potential buyer know the real story. I look for a lot of stars, but I read very carefully the lower star reviews. This gives me tremendous confidence when I plunk down my hard earned money on a book or a product. Not sure if e-books get reviewed the same way.AstroGremlin recently posted..
I wonder what Mr./Dr. Thompson would have to say about Will Smith… Probably that Independence Day wasn’t onvleit enough and waaaay too Establishment.(Glad you grabbed the poster from our site. Come on back anytime.)
He’s just 25 years old, but Beat Magazine in Melbourne has already ellbaed Tommy ‘The Future of Funny’. Labelled has a double- `L’. Change your spell checker settings.
When I was in my early teens I would read 6 books a week. I remember this as that was the muaimxm the library would allow us, and I would go to the library every week.I don’t keep tabs of how many books per year I read now, although after reading your post I may do that. I read mostly in bed as I struggle to fall asleep without winding down first. My life is so hectic that the half an hour at the end of day to read is bliss. I did used to read in my lunchbreak, but am studying a distance learning journalism course now so my lunchtimes are spent in the library studying journalism modules.Being able to commute to work would be a good time to schedule some reading time. I spend 10 hours a week in the car travelling to and from work oohh what I could do with that extra time instead of listening to Radio 1!!
, I think we actually agree more than we dseigrae, we’re just taking different meanings of inspiration. Inspiration of the amen variety is great. There is nothing wrong with bringing that kind of inspiration forth into art. I loooooove Haydn and Bach and they were definitely very inspired people. Inspiration of the rent is due so I’m gonna put my feces in a mason jar and sell it as Art, that’s bad. I think we pretty much agree there. What I was more getting at with my earlier comment is that once one has a book deal with a deadline, it’s good to be able to turn it out under pressure, inspired or not.On the other hand, your last paragraph is the very opposite of what I believe. But that’s ok too.
Sounds like great advice! I puaticalrrly like the idea of getting some reviews available before the general public’ is invited. Did you find that 1 day was enough? Making sure the reviews are honest makes a lot of sense too I expect most of my beta testers for my first app will be friends, I’ll make sure they know that I really do want them to be fair in their review. Thanks! Bookmarked for planning our launch!
I live on a teeny tiny island and there are 3 drfiefent bookstores on here and I think they are all independent except for maybe 1. I’m not sure because this store also has three others in South Florida its called Books and Books. The other two though have been here for as long as I can remember and were always each others competitions. The only really problem I have with all the bookstores here though is the limited selection on manga/graphic novels. Maybe manga doesn’t have a big market here but I would love to finally find a store here with a wide manga selection instead of having to go to a big chain store to stock up when I go away on vacation.
All of the Downton ladies “upstairs and downstairs” are reading Maisie Dobbs! And I trust they will be passing the books on to the curious gentlemen in their lives.
I fully expect to see The Maisie Dobbs series on PBS in the not-too-distant future.
Thank you, Jacqueline Winspear, for reaching out to your readers and keeping up timely connections!!
J. Have you ever considered contacting the BBC about “doing” your Maisie Dobbs series?!!!! They do period drama well and your stories are very interesting. D.
Regarding whether “downstairs” staff could read – most certainly they could. Though most would have left school at twelve years of age, even the most lowly child would have had a solid grounding in the “three R’s.” Discipline was at a high level, and though there are always exceptions (truancy), those exceptions remain today. To illustrate this, check out this recent article (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2087605/Fannie-Bryans-magical-century-old-exercise-book-humbling-lesson-todays-schools.html) – the exercise book belonging to a nine-year old gamekeeper’s daughter was found recently, and sheds light upon the levels of accomplishment attained by children in the last century. My grandmother was of that generation – left school at 12, if not before – and she read five or six books each week throughout her life – this despite losing the sight of one eye in a munitions factory accident in the Great War. The library was her favorite place.
Georgene Moizuk Bramlage posted on
February 8, 2012
Very interesting and well-researched article. One question, however. How many of the “downstairs” staff might have been able to read? Was there universal primary education available in the UK during this time period?
I loved your listing. My wife and I follow all the stuff on PBS stations. The other one for us is Knowledge in BC Canada. I thoroughly enjoy the Historic shows – right in my alley. I also think the famous poetry of Service – from the Klondyke gold rush time at Dawson city. “the cremation of Sam McGee”. and I always remember my mother, a lady brought up as a “Young social lady” standing before us reciting “There is a Green-eyed yellow idolteo the north of Catmandoo, there’s a broken hearted woman in the town, etc” – spoken very dramatically.
I always buy my daughter a copy of your new books (except I read them first”.
Anna, Lady Mary’s maid would be reading Agatha CHristie or any other good Murder Mystery she could get her hands on. Bless her.
Agree with others, can’t wait for “Eddie”
Having been a friend of Dr. Ray for quite a few years now, I can honestly say he is a maniac and a fiend. He’s also a very good writer. You should read his work.
None of this is going to happen of course. Even so, I do wish people would break away, as much as possible, from reading only the season’s most obvious writers and books. Be brave. Buy a collection of poems every so often, explore genre fiction and the midlist, go back to that classic you always meant to try again, study the important books on the subjects that interest you. Above all, just say no to the insidious dominion of the best seller.”
Will be sad to tell my 94 yr old mother that Lillian Braun has gone. She was an avid reader of the cat who series and for two years after 60 whiskers,she would inquire every day–”have you heard anything about the book;is Lillian well and writing again? I am sad too. What an amazing
person she must have been. Such a great talent and imagination. Not likely to be forgotten.
Oh my soul for the return of the beatniks, and let me return to the curse of lono once again to giggle senselessly at the antics of this great legend Was just listening to a recording of The Book Report by Elaine Charles, wherein Thompson’s collection is discussed. Definitely a must have for a collector.
Mid-Life – compounded by relocation away from family and friends, loss of job, black balled and empty nest, I am there. I have found great satisfaction writing poetry and prose. Never having written before, I find it amazing that within 9 months I’ve completed a manuscript. My professors
and friends encouraged me to do so. As a mother, it was if I have given birth all over again, to myself. Currently in the infancy stage, yearning hugs and kisses to help me grow.
Hirohito Protagonist Wannabe posted on
December 29, 2011
(DON’T SELL MY EMAIL OR I’LL ENGAGE YOU IN A SWORDFIGHT AND HACK YOUR HEAD OFF!) I read this book and before I read it, I thought that Douglas Adams was the only person who could write a science fiction novel that was even remotely funny. The dry humor in this book and the programming culture and the Metaverse…it hit the spot. It’s now my favorite book, actually. I’m an incessant reader of science fiction, so I was hoping you could point me in the direction of more funny books like Stephenson’s that have hacker/programmer references integrated into the plot (heck, the plot is made for hackers!). Thanks! Best book ever!
I’ve seen the Godfather movie, and have read the book. Personally, I preferred the book. It could be because I saw the movie about 20 years after it was made, and it just seemed dated. All of the famous lines were cliche by then, and I had seen hundreds of impressions of Marlon Brando. I read the book just a couple of years ago, and enjoyed it quite a bit. My favorite story line in the book is about young Don Corleone. This made up the story line of Godfather II, which I really liked. But I still liked the book better.
As Kindle becomes more popular I find it harder and harder to jump on board. I love the feeling of holding a book and turning the pages.. marking the tops with tiny folds when I need to save my page. I spend 10+ hours in front of a computer screen and countless playing with my cell phone and it’s just a nice break from technology to pick up a book.
I would encourage one and all to follow the instructions on lilicomputing to sideload golauncher, homecapture, and the Amazon market and streaming apps onto your nook tablet. Add a sd card for additional memory and you have a great tablet with access to tons of content, including all of Amazon’s streaming media (that can also be downloaded for viewing when you are off WiFi).
I think the Kobo’s got better than long odds to establish themselves. Amazon has really messed up with the Fire’s international aspect: even Apple gets that, with the iPad immediately useful in international markets.
The Kobo dominates its home country (Canada), and because it isn’t dependent on the US to develop its marketplace and concept, it can transport itself to the UK and the EU much more easily.
Amazon might want to hire a few extra lawyers for its copyright clearance team, if it is smart.
I did do some shopping on Friday afternoon without much success because if you weren’t there at 2am then you were out of luck. Then yesterday morning I bought a TV online for a better price than the one I went out to buy on Friday! With all of that being said I went out last night to Walmart (which was in total shambles) and was told by an employee that a fight broke out between a man and an older women. Why would anyone want to miss a fight over a waffle iron that ended in him punching her in the face. With all of this being said I was almost sad that I could miss such in-store chaos.
I feel that the stress of the holidays would only be exaggerated by dying while trying to obtain gifts for my loved ones…not to mention the added obligation of paying for a funeral during a fiscally difficult time of year. That aside, Black Friday is heavily marketed as the busiest shopping day of the year, but in actuality, it isn’t…only the most animalistic.
I absolutely loved this book! For the first time, time travel makes some sense without some kind of crafty expedient. Excellent historical research: I’ve checked all that concerns Oswald, his associates, etc. and it’s quite accurate. An excellent thriller, Stephen King’s style, based on historical facts. I highly recommend it!
I’ve also noticed that a few of Amazon’s latest Kindle Daily Deals have been for books from its imprints…which appear to also be available for Prime members to borrow for free. Interesting times, these!
Definitely John Irving
Replace Anthony Bourdain with Julia Child (She seems more kindly and warm than Bourdain. He scares me.)
Tennesee Williams (Just to have someone at the table called Tennesee)
Harper Lee. Just because.
And Brooke Beyfuss-Powell. Because I want to live.
I would vote to have Charlaine Harris at my dinner table. It would start out as an innocent meal and then out of the blue there would be vampires, fairies and werewolves flying into the topic of conversation. Who wouldn’t love that?
Amazon probably has as much legal right to lend books which it purchases as any library or, for that matter, any individual has, thanks to the First-Sale Doctrine. This law (17 U.S.C. Section 109) allows a purchaser to lend, sell, or give away a copyrighted work without seeking anyone’s permission once it has been obtained (Wikipedia–First-Sale Doctrine).
Of course, if two of its Prime customers want the same book at the same time, Amazon must purchase two copies, or be guilty of copyright infringement. This, on certain titles, Amazon seems ready to do. And unless Amazon has specifically (and foolishly) signed away that legal right with certain publishers, I see no reason why they can’t do the same with any title.
More worrisome, from the author’s point of view, are “the vast majority [of titles]” (Amazon officer quoted in the Wall Street Journal) for which Amazon is paying publishers a flat fee, reportedly on an annual basis. How are author royalties being computed in these instances?
Most worrisome, however, is the uncertain fate awaiting the institution of the public library should Amazon or some other commercial entity assemble a comprehensive, reasonably priced eBook lending service for an eReading public now starved for content. At present, neither public libraries via Overdrive, the Open Library movement, nor Amazon’s rather risibly limited Kindle Owner’s Lending Library comes close to satisfying that need.
I really like your history of the latte! Figures Americans messed it up with too much milk. Anyway, I once wrote a little poem in the back section of Java House in Iowa City. I think I was drinking a latte too because I remember the way they decorated the foam with a coffee swirl. If I lived near Java House, I would write a great novel there, but sadly I was only visiting. Since there are no cool cafes in the icky MI town where I currently live, that novel will have to wait.
Oh man I know what you mean with the dangers of funny books while driving. The one that nearly did me in was Bill Bryson’s A Walk In The Woods.
Bill Bryson’s delivery of the line “My you sure do like Pancakes” while impersonating an obese waitress flirting with his obese friend Katz, had me crying laughing from the beginning to the end of a three mile road.
Opps – this is not the blog that was offering a free book to be selected by their dog for comments.
It was ‘Writerhead’ which is one blog post removed backwards from here! Duh… can’t keep track of things at this age and Eric is on an eclectic virtual book tour … dc
dick cummins class of ’70 posted on
November 10, 2011
I don’t write in restaurants because it can be too distracting … as in – “Couples play out scenes in restaurants,” you mentioned Mamet writes.
This is a ‘couples’ restaurant story I know from McGraw-Hill’s Textbook Division, Midtown Rock Center that happened in the late ’60′s.
Early 40-something editor George asks advice of Spanish acquisitions consultant for the Advertising list …
“Hey Emile – my wife found out about Ivana in steno and I have to break it off. She’s so emotional in bed I think there could be trouble. Got any ideas for me?”
“Sure. Take her to the Chez Montparnasse for lunch. Wall to wall CEO’s, Wall Street lawyers and their paramours! So intimidating you’ll be safe – can’t fail!”
Around 3:00 pm the next day I see George talking to Emile in his office. He has his head in his hands.
“It was all crystal and class all right. After the wine and sole I told her we couldn’t see each other anymore because Audrey found her sexy note in my pocket – and – well, you know, I have to consider my kids and all that.”
“Did she understand? Everything under control?”
“Not exactly. She stood up so fast her chair fell over backward and everybody turned to stare.”
‘So this is why you didn’t take me to Chock Full a Nuts then?” she shouted. “And why do you think I care if we’re through? Listen Georgie boy,” she hissed. “All you ever wanted to do was fuck, fuck, fuck — and you know what? YOU WEREN’T EVEN VERY GOOD AT THAT!’
I’d never met Ivana then but I really wanted to and I bet Hemingway would have liked to have written about her too – but the scene would have had to have been in a sidewalk cafe in Paris of course and she have to say ‘screw’ the times not having changed.
Eric – I think you’re right about writing in a coffee shop or cafe, people in restaurants can make it hard to concentrate.
Your friend, dick cummins, class of ’70
P.S Daniel – if the dog picks my name, send me the free book as even though I have a collectors’ copy already signed by several of the perpetrators, ‘We Wanted to Be Writers’ will make a good gift to my class of ’70 failed writer friends — and after all, the Holidays are just around the corner.
I feel like this article needs a mention of “Princess Bride”- a book which was presented as the “abridged” version of a longer work by S. Morganstern…which didn’t exist, of course. I know more than one person who wound up looking for the “original Morganstern version” of Princess Bride!
I got a Prime membership for the shipping, so everything else is pretty much gravy for me…but are we talking about access to library books, or are we talking about the new lending library thing?
I just recently read War and Peace for the first time – on my Kindle. So nice not to have to hold a brick in my lap.
Ereaders open up flexibility on length – in all directions. Short fiction is also doing well in ebook form. People who don’t have a lot of time and don’t want to spend a lot to try a new author can get a short story for $.99 or so.
I have writen in varying cafes voer the last few months, and I’ve found soem places more conducive than others. sadly the only stand alone coffee shop by my house seems to suck the life from my writing. I’ll be traying the Library this week. And, as crazy as it might sound, I might try the grocery store I shop at weekly. They have a cofee shop and bakery (even ready made sandwiches and susi) and a very nice, blocked off from the rest of the store, with a gas fireplace, eating and lounging area. I nee to scope out the outlet placement though I’m often never away long enough to run out of juice if I plan things properly.
I for one am definitely less conscious of the length of what I’m reading on an e-reader – which is mostly a good thing. I may miss the sense of accomplishment upon finishing a huge book.
Walking Dead is by far THE best comic book adaption ever done on television by far. My jaw dropped after the first few episodes because it was so well done. When I first heard that it was being made into a series I thought OK this would be great on HBO… IF they did it right. When I found out it was going to be on AMC I was ‘no! no! no! no!’ Boy, was I wrong! They managed to put everything that is needed into the series without worrying about censorship.
Hey I know I’m gushing about this series but c’mon, some episodes are even better than the source material ( the Godfather syndrome ) and that’s rare.
Your comment about the show capturing the “flavor” of the original is an understatement. This is a very faithful adaption that completely captures the concept and themes of the comic. The Zombies are almost incidental. The series is mainly about how Rick and the other humans survive this plague, and most importantly… how they survive each other.
As far as other fanboys wanting an exact panel by panel narrative. Well let’s just say that these are the kind of people that complained about Hugh Jackman’s excellent Wolverine from the first two X-men movies because his claws didn’t pop out further down from the back of his hands! I’m sorry, but several of the main characters are very faithful to their comic book couterparts. Rick is the moral man who always tries to do the right thing in spite of tough decisions, and Shane… well let’s just say that the decision to keep Shane around was a great idea, and he is actually a much better and more complex character than he is in the comics.
What a lame cop out from Gia. I find that cycling between eating institutions and libraries and home keeps me fresh enough to want to write more. And then I get online and comment on posts about writing to make myself feel like a writer when I’m not revising the concert review that was supposed to get done today.
Jonathan, I think I’m going to post the guide on my bulletin board! I’ve stopped asking for feedback because I wasn’t getting anything meaningful. My favorite is, “You must have worked really hard on it.” Well, yeah.
LOVE THIS. As an author, I usually assume that when someone says they “loved” my book, unless they mention specific passages that moved them, they skimmed it or simply didn’t read it. Personally, if they bought it, I don’t care, but…
My favorite moment along these lines was when I was at a conference and ran into a professional acquaintance who said,
“Congratulations on your book! Read it, loved it. It was so awesome. Girl, you are too cool.”
I had just turned in the manuscript to my editor and the book wouldn’t be published for another year and two months. Instead, I think this guy saw the Facebook invitation for the party I threw to celebrate the completion of writing my book, and he assumed that it was the book party. I got a laugh out of it, but I also definitely lost respect for him. It’s okay to lie and say you read someone’s book, but make sure it’s been published first.
One definite plus with a long book on an e-reader, it is much more comfortable to read. I recently finished Stephen King’s “Under the Dome” which is over 1000 pages and it was hard to get comfortable holding the hard cover book to read. More so now that I have an e-reader to compare it to.
As a professional writer, this is something I run into a lot, especially when I was job-hunting: everyone thinks that they can write, especially people who do reasonably well speaking/presenting. And don’t let anyone fool you; there ARE some overlapping skills there.
But knowing the language is not the same as expressing it well, and even speaking it well is not the same as being able to write it well. Unfortunately, since everyone thinks they can write, there are two major consequences:
1) A LOT of people apply for writing gigs to earn a little extra income, even if they’re unqualified. Because they’re unqualified they’re willing to work very inexpensively, devaluing the work of professionals.
2) Employers/clients think that they could handle the writing if only they didn’t have so much else to do, so they bring on unpaid interns or pay minimum wage to handle the work on a long-term or ongoing basis, further devaluing the work of professionals.
Now, obviously not everyone does these two things, and I’m not even one to say “never work for free!” or anything like that. I have been very fortunate in procuring employment pretty consistently. However, and particularly in our present age of constant content, I have watched these things go on and it’s really quite odd; as the *demand* for content goes up, the *perceived value* of such content seems to be going down rather than up with it…
Wow. Just. . . wow. I kinda want to fly up to NY just to be able to personally watch this thing in action. (*mentally adding this to my bucket list. xD)
Is there a fee to use the machine, or is it just free to use?
I can’t wait to see what people come up with for books before I die. Not that I don’t love me the peace and quiet of a “plain ol’ book” book, I’ve spent my entire life being amazed by what people come up with as new technology arises.
(I was born in the 80s, just a bit before computers were something everyone had. So I have that handy knack for picking up new tech quickly without being unimpressed about the new stuff )
I entirely empathize! My big ‘wins’ in H.S. and college were my socio-political essays. I grew weary of this type of writing and wished to spend more time on poetry. I was a great Dylan Thomas and John Updike fan and happened to have had Jessie Stuart as a H.S. English teacher. My reading has spanned virtually everything from Homer to contemporary works (mostly foreign these days). I studied the classics and have read in Latin, Ancient Greek and Chinese literature. I, too, write both prose and poetry and have never been able to decide on which I should be spending more of my time. They both demand about the same focus and time to create. I am consistently at war with myself over this ongoing dilemma. I have more recently (and after many years of essentially hiding my work) published a rather lengthy YA fantasy novel that seemed to naturally lend itself to a poetic-prose narrative and contained enough originality of plot and dynamics to warrent the immense effort. Although I have begun (many times anew) a new and very different type of work, I have been finding myself returning again and again to poetry, which, as you have noted, is not so popular (unless it is ‘hip-hop’ or some such variety of junk poetry). I am addicted to the way language can be used to produce as many moods; to express as many dimensions as possible. If you would be interested in looking at some of my poetry and to exchange viewpoints. I would be pleased (and vise-versa) Otherwise, I certainly wish you all the best.
I am writing a book on how I went from being born into poverty to retiring at age 46 without hitting the lottery, inheriting a penny, without picking out a home run stock or any other get rich quick scheme. Rather being responsible, frugal, enjoying what’s less costly and free, saving, investing, budgeting, avoidance of debt and taking control of my finances without being brainwashed by a system that tells you when you can retire. The Title is “Don’t Let the System Tell you When” You can see my first year “freedom” pictures on facebook (alternate name: Jo-Cat) of how I am now living MY dream not the system’s dream. You can twitter me @Jocatthekid and you can email me on stopthegreed on yahoo. The book is 75% done and it will be a straight forward, honest, guide on how to retire in your forties so that you can spend your most precious finite resource (time) as you wish. I am considering Amazon above and others as publishers. I welcome publishers and promoters to consider all offers for publications etc. This book is NOT a get rich scheme, it gives step by step instructions on what to do, what not to do, who to trust, who not to trust, myths and disciplines. This will change the lives of those who wish to have more leisure time. My life is the proof that you can retire in your 40s by following my investment ideas, saving discipline, budgeting, and understanding of different asset types from the simplicity of CDs, ETFs, Mutual Funds, Shorts to cover longs, rental property, tax lien certificates, Sovereignty debt, real estate, hard assets, energy, utilization of dividends, currency plays, precious metals, etc… Leveraging and conservative low risk choices is my life story that enabled me to now sleep in late and enjoy a life of leisure. Avoidance of those who care more about profiting from your money than growing it is one key. Investment vehicles such as 401Ks, 403bs, 457b, IRAs, and how to utilize tax law to take equal lifetime expectancy withdraws at an age you decide along with my 3-tier approach to providing income that is efficient to pay the least amount of income tax is covered. It’s not rocket science but it does require you to understand the best asset types and when to buy and sell and what to buy and hold, etc. The “gurus” complicate the uncomplicated to confuse the masses. This is not a work 3 years and retire program rather work within 20 years max and you can easily retire comfortably without pulling in 6 figures a year. Obviously avoid debt that is not an investment and I will give you the first key, buy a home that you can pay off within 15 years max, 10 years better, 5 years and man your going to be watching the weather for leisure instead of your commute to the office. I am excited to set people free. God Bless, Sincerely Jon aka Jo-Cat
I agree he played up the image, why wouldn’t he, it was his meal ticket. But he realized the problems it caused. In that same BBC documentary he talks about killing off Duke, saying the image prevented him from covering stories in the way he was initially accustomed to. I’m a big fan of entire Hunter Thomspson mystique, but I’d rather people dig a little deeper and find out exactly who they’re idolizing.
I lived in Italy in the mid 70′S and the Europeans are much more traditionally minded than Americans even to this day. Just walk through London and see how many small books stores there are versus New York and It’s still a big deal about first editions of classic books. So It’s no surprise Amazons Kindle E-readers haven’t been a smash hit there. Asia’s a completely different story. In Japan space is at such a premium you can’t have rooms filled with just books and not people. I would expect the Kindle Fire will become a big hit when it goes on sale there.
Some nice insight on The Rum Diaries but as for Thompson’s relationship with Raoul Duke I can’t say I agree a hundred percent with your police work there Lou.
You can accuse Thompson of a lot of stuff, but trying to play down Raoul Duke isn’t one of them. I agree that the persona eventually subsumed him, and in the aftermath of the Thrilla In Manilla it more or less destroyed him as a writer. But frankly that’s as much Thompson’s fault as anyone’s. Watch Fear And Loathing On The Road To Hollywood, the BBC documentary, and you see someone who is deliberately playing into their legend. And that was way back in 1978.
Here’s an interesting excerpt from the introduction to the new collection Fear And Loathing At Rolling Stone by Paul Scalon,
“A few months after the election we were sitting in Jerry’s. Hunter looked like hell and was clearly not in great spirits. For reasons that will ever elude me, I decided to give him a helpful lecture. Retire your alter ego Raoul Duke, I said. Or send him on a long vacation. Go back to being the journalist who wrote Hells Angels. Cut back a little on the drugs and the booze. He turned towards me as he reached into the pocket of his safari jacket. He gave me a look; nothing nasty, just a look. He extracted a tab of Mr. Natural blotter acid from the pocket, stared me in the eye, and swallowed it. I got the message. Our conversation resumed. ”
There was a lot more to Hunter Thompson than a head full of acid. Unfortunately, not all of the time.
Great analysis, Jada. This is a topic that really intrigues me…especially as a huge fairy tale fan. I constantly checked out the original Grimm’s from my school library starting in probably third grade, and it’s amazing how twisted they are (and how much more so they used to be).
As someone who’s worked in an industry that suffers a great deal due to piracy (Japanese comics/cartoons), I think implementing some criminal punishment for certain forms of piracy is a good idea.
However, to say that a law “wouldn’t” be used to prosecute this, that, or the other thing is just silly. I haven’t read the text of the bill myself, but if it doesn’t explicitly SAY it only applies to people who are making money off of illicit streams, then it doesn’t count! All it would take is one company with a connection to a prosecutor’s office to get that law used in a way other than intended.
Again, I haven’t read the text myself, so maybe it is explicitly stated. But if not…that should probably be fixed!
On one hand: I also giggled when I read this article, and felt an elation that I haven’t felt in weeks. I guess that’s what the possible demise of Justin Bieber does to me. On the other hand: in a larger sense, I’m not shocked. Welcome to American where balance does not exist, where there is only black or white, and the pendulum is at either point of it’s path but never passes through the middle. Copyrighted material does need to be protected, but the process of determining that needs to be a tad less arbitrary.
Just a note– Drops of God is considered a pretty big deal! Gilt Taste called it “the most important wine book” of the moment, and whenever new chapters come out in Japan, the wines it mentions see their sales skyrocket! Pretty cool stuff.
Also, I haven’t read it yet myself, but Vertical does excellent releases so I’m sure the first volume is simply stunning.
Seriously, people tend to get nervous when they see all of the rights that sites’ TOS demand, but the reality is that they HAVE to have those rights in order to legally share your content the way *you* specifically want it to, if you want things to carry over to other social media, to notify your friends on that site, etc. It’s all very complicated >_>
The smart move for Reddit would be to sit back and enjoy the attention. “Sure, Digg, but did any of YOUR comments get made into a major motion picture?”
If they kicked up a fuss about the rights, I expect it would garner some ill-will, as well as making people nervous about contributing to the site.
But does Reddit really retain movie rights in its terms of service? I’d love to see a lawyer look those over to see how much hypothetical leg Reddit would have to stand on. Most of the rights held in a TOS are specifically for using comments for their own promotional purposes, for their appearances on various pages on their own site, for their appearance on other sites (like Facebook or Twitter), etc.
He’s a total rock star. The ironic part is that his book The Hours is one where I really wanted to flip back and forth, which is so hard to do in an e-book. Maybe I would have clung to hieroglyphics too…
What happened to freedom in this country? Once they passed on her novels, previous OR subsequent, they should have lost any right to limit her putting them wherever she chose! I was shocked at Penquin’s stand on this. I would never even consider doing business with them after hearing about this. My hope is that this will go to court and Keana Davenport can live on a huge settlement for many great years of writing!
Myracle was very gracious about the whole ordeal. What a giant let down but a classy recovery. That should earn her some brownie points from other readers!
I honestly never knew it was a comic but I’m not surprised. I’ve seen the show a few times and it was okay, but in my opinion, it’s become a bit annoying when they shoehorn horror into a soap opera type format, or dramatic series, or whatever you want to call it…I don’t know, when it comes to horror I kinda like one-offs.
I’m a big fan of this show (and I hate, hate, hate gore) and because of it I became aware of the comics. I wasn’t planning to read the comics (at this time anyway) because I just figured it would reveal way to much about the series. I may give it a shot now, or at least I’ll start reading earlier than I had originally planned.
I think it is very strange too about the miscommunication. You’d think this would have been in writing including the author names – not just a phone call. It’s all very unfortunate and takes the focus off where it should be – the great works of the finalists.
Who is this young Emma person, anyhow? She’s dazzling! I some how feel that I even know her! But she’s wrong about one thing in her FM Ford comments — he really was prolific, but many of his books are terrible. However, the Tietjens Quartet is just as good as The Good Soldier. Emma’s father, whom I know personally, has all these books in first editions.
I found the whole thing about the mis-announced finalist very odd. Sure, the books rhymed, but who really makes that kind of mistake? That would be really embarrassing!
I tend to be a bit behind on my lit, so all of these are books I haven’t picked up yet. I’m really excited for a few of them though!
I’m truly sorry that I missed your thoughtful comment when it was originally posted! I’m so busy–as my articles imply–and terrible about keeping up with online stuff.
I could not be more honored by being chosen as your Pick of the Day. I am so sad that I missed the discussion. I will make an extraordinary effort to be there this week.
Thank you again for your kind words. The sort of praise and support you’ve given me here is the greatest reinforcement and encouragement during this particularly busy and difficult time in my life.
If anything, I’ll always be journaling. Thanks again, and I look forward to talking to you soon!
I just recently saw the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode that addresses this topic (briefly). That episode was from 1997, and I was thinking about how as far as I was aware, not much had changed in these 14 years. I’m glad to see people are still drawing attention to the matter, both Ms. Miré and the people mentioned in the New York Times article.
It’s a tough thing to talk about, which makes such talk all the more important!
This is a fascinating article, and I applaud Barry Eisler (and Timothy Ferris). Like me, more and more published authors are going the self-published route. This involves an incredible amount of work above and beyond the writing including creating titles, book covers, content, web presence, social media management, and public relations to name a few. The benefit is that you keep control. It’s a very different ballgame, and I think the more authors that cross over, the more the general public will be aware that there are really great self-published works out there. Thanks, gentlemen, for taking this leap of faith!
That’s good to know, I have to admit I was really taken aback by TDOSM being pushed back. I’m looking forward to reading Woe To Live On myself, as I can’t quite bring myself to pay hundreds of dollars for a paperback.
You’ll be happy to know that all of his books are going to be back in print by the spring. Check the Little Brown website. I got to meet Woodrell last week at an appearance in San Francisco and he confirmed it. There is also a film version of The Ones You Do (the third of the Bayou Trilogy) in the works.
I think Woodrell is the best writer in America at the moment. (No qualifying adjective “crime” needed.) I’m not sure The Outlaw Album is the place for newbies to start, since the stories tend to be more “on the nose” and less complex than the novels. I’d point people toward Tomato Red myself. But great blog post calling attention to a great writer.
“I love my ereader and one of the best things about it is all the free books I have gotten from indie authors just starting out.” -Mammysfave
How do you “know” if an author is just starting out? And what does “starting out” have to do with the price? Lump all self publishers in the “just starting out” bin and keep them on “free” and 99 cents, or whatever. I know you didn’t say those words exactly but I keep hearing this “just starting out” business again and again.
To the author of this article, yes, I can see clearly now that ADS are the only way writers are going to be able to make money in the digital world. People online don’t want to pay for anything, which is their choice, but ebooks will not thrive on the free. Ebook consumers don’t know, understand, or CARE how much work goes into writing an Ebook. Kindles just came out 3 years ago and the content is already rock-bottom cheap at 99 cents, just in 3 short years. Where do we go from there? 50 cents? 30?
No, the only people who’ll be financially well-off from the Ebook market will be Amazon, Apple, Barnes & Nobles, Google, and possibly Facebook (if they continue to get involved). Writers can forget it. If you don’t believe me, keep watching. My advice to a writer right now would be to get out of ebooks and go into something else that’s NOT related to writing, something that people value, because they certainly don’t value the writing profession.
What a great premise for zombies, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone take this angle! While the fighting/killing zombies is always fun, this sounded heartbreaking from the get-go, definitely worth checking out. I saw the film version of Let Me In and I thought it was very well done, creepy yes, but also terribly sad.
If the truth was actually told about some of these great figures of history we would never get a day off. We would just be a little more traumatized then we are now. Great article, how englightening.
As something of a comics reader myself, I’ve been waiting to see more graphic novels on e-readers. Manga (Japanese comics) are starting to get there on iDevices, but the Kindle has been pretty devoid of manga– which, generally being in black-and-white, is so much more feasible on the e-ink Kindles than American comics!
Christian,
Not only was this post beautifully written, I just loved your whole point of view on the journaling process and your experience both past and present.
It is so true that our journal presents our encounter with the world with our own eyes; and our point of view is valuable!
I so appreciate the pleasure the process gives you; I take delight in my a.m. and p.m. journaling. You have so many ideas and approaches to your journal entries. I love how that keeps things fresh and interesting. A Truly Custom approach and experience.
I have chosen your post, Lost Among Words: Journaling Uncovers the Beauty of Mundane Life, as the #JournalChat Pick of the Day for all things journaling on Twitter. I will post a link on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, my blog and website, Refresh with Dawn Herring, and in Refresh Journal: http://refreshwithdawnherring.blogspot.com/.
You’re welcome to join us for #JournalChat Live on Thursdays at 4 CST/2 PST on Twitter; our topic this week on using different journaling techniques.
Thanks again for such an interesting and thought provoking inside view of journaling!
Be refreshed,
Dawn Herring
JournalWriter Freelance
Host of #JournalChat Live and Links Edition on Twitter
Having worked for Population Services International (PSI), I was very excited to read this book and hear Ashley Judd’s accounts of her travels and her work with PSI. I have to say, though, I was a little underwhelmed by her story. I acknowledge that since this book is a memoir, it does require a certain level of self-centeredness on the part of the author. However, I felt there was a little too much focus on her opinions and feelings, and less attention to telling a good story.
In her accounts of her childhood, I felt that Ashley too often portrayed herself as the victim, constantly pointing out how she was mistreated and abused. While I don’t discount the pain and suffering she went through growing up, this constant reminding only made me, as a reader, less sympathetic to her situation. She came across as whiny and repetitive.
Her descriptions of her humanitarian work also left me feeling annoyed. She portrayed the women, men, and children she met as victims, incapable of escaping their horrible plight, thereby stripping them of any sense of empowerment. I felt that her focus on this victimhood contradicted the work of the organization she claimed to represent. PSI, as an organization, is committed to empowering men and women to make healthy choices in their behavior, so I was saddened to read that Ashley Judd, as a board member of PSI, reflected the exact opposite of this philosophy.
This book is by no means a bad read. I found her writing to be eloquent and descriptive, and she shows a great appreciation for the people she meets through her work and her life. For someone like her to use her high-profile status to bring attention to humanitarian issues like HIV/AIDS and sex slavery is honorable, and I wish that more celebrities would take a cue from her and do the same. However, for a good story, I would suggest looking elsewhere.
It’s a tough debate…I mean, I think of myself as a good person overall, but I’m not sure I would want future generations to judge my actions outside of the context of my society’s values and whatnot, y’know? On the other hand, it’s not like Columbus’s actions went completely without censure even in his own time.
I love this quote too: “He has been able to breathe life into the most uninspiring realities of modern existence and in this way has significantly broadened the scope of our poetic vision of the world.” – Jaan Kaplinski, from his 1990 nominating statement for Tranströmer.
It’s weird to catch up on my weekly reads and come across an article like this knowing it was posted just a couple days before his death.
The combination of his resignation, biographies (official and not), the first Jobs-less apple developer’s conference, and his death has made this week incredibly weird but ultimately unforgettable.
I’m fascinated by how steampunk as a fiction movements seems to be really, uh, gaining steam! Next week an anthology (titled, cleverly, “Steampunk!”) is coming out with shorts from a number of authors, such as Cory Doctorow and Elizabeth Knox, as well as some lesser-knowns. I stumbled upon it by accident but am looking forward to it
Thanks for interviewing my idol, Hope! I haven’t had the good fortune to meet Nora Roberts yet, but I imagine she’s personable like this interview suggests.
I like her advice to focus on the writing. That’s what I’ll do.
I guess I’m old because I remember the first computer I ever used was an old Mac with a tiny, black and white monitor. I think our school had three of them. I think I liked using “Paint” the most, but I don’t know if it was called that then.
Great interview, Hope! I didn’t start reading NR until about five years ago, but since then I’ve made up for lost time. Her discipline is inspiring, and though I doubt I’ll ever be as successful as she is, there’s a lot to learn from her.
Thanks so much for the link to that speech. It’s a great one, very encouraging. The parts about death, though, are pretty sad, in retrospect, but it’s a speech I’m going to save for encouragement in the future.
I am not a fan of Apple products. I have never bought one myself, and the last time I used an Apple as my primary computer they were still called “Macs” and it had a black and white screen. I find Apple’s management of content a bit scary, to be frank, and was incensed when Steve Jobs claimed to want to “protect” us from porn.
That said, I respect that the man developed tools and technology that I use to immense satisfaction to this day. Had there been no iPod, would my Sansa mp3 player exist? Without the iPhone, would my Android phone be as superb? For whatever faults he may have (and he was human, and he had some), Jobs’ work with Apple has impacted a generation in ways we’ve only just begun to witness, and even the most vitriolic Apple opponent owes him a great deal of respect.
In concept I actually appreciate that Amazon is attempting to make their readers available at lower prices to those willing to accept the…deformity, if you will.
But in practice, I can’t imagine why anyone would rather have a lifetime of ads in their books than spend another $30-40!
People are certainly fascinated with it, and the media will do its best to turn out as much product relating to it as fast as possible while interest is still high. If Knox herself doesn’t write/ghost-write a book shortly, I expect a few unauthorized biographies or case analyses to come out. In the digital age a publisher can get out an electronic edition fast.
Maybe they’ll even do one of those weird biography comic books, too.
You know, Daniel, you mentioned Jim Dale and Harry Potter audio books, and I’ve heard they’re good…but I don’t think I could deal with audio books that are quite that long. My favorite audio books were all pretty short.
Shannon– I just started using an electronic calendar last month, so it is good to know that I am not the only one. Oddly enough, I got an e-reader before I went to an electronic calendar. I agree that we will adapt with fewer opportunities to get paper books.
That’s interesting, but I also think that sometimes we don’t necessarily tell the entire truth about our lives, especially when we know it’s going to be printed for the world to read.
I listen to audio books when I run. Some celebrities work well with a book (let’s face it: Go The F*** To Sleep wouldn’t have been a thing without Sam Jackson); some don’t…it’s never really bothered me either way.
I would say that David Sedaris, who does the readings for his own books, is really fun to listen to. He’s got deadpan down pat!
I tend to steer clear of biographies because no one can tell the story of your life better than you can.
I just recently finished Decision Points by George Bush and just so happens that my father was reading a George Bush biography. After comparing notes, we found that the biography had statements that contradicted the autobiography.
I’ve never listened to an audio book. To me, it’s not comparable to reading. But the first person to pique my interest in audio books is Sarah Vowell. I’ve never read any of her books but I heard her speak at the National Book Festival last week and apparently she goes the extra mile for her audio books.
I think paper books will disappear but I don’t think it will be within the next decade.
I don’t like the idea of e-books right now but its just the resistance to change. I just started using an electronic calendar within the last year and now I don’t write my schedule down at all anymore.
Hate it or love it it’s coming. And we will all adapt because we will have no other choice.
This is a really tough question; personally, I don’t think I’ve seen a movie that was better than the book. Good thoughts on the Godfather though – but I never read that book and can’t compare the two!
As Seth mentioned in his blog post last week -”Go ahead and invent your own cover if you like. Weird is everywhere you look, even the mirror.” So I thought I’d make it easy for any weirdoes like me to do so. You can create your own book cover at http://www.customweareallweird.com.
Nicely done, though I take issue with the idea that there is anything particularly incongruous about Catholicism leading to sharp subversive writing.
O’Connor may stand above but she does not stand alone. I mean look at Graham Greene, Walker Percy, GK Chesterton (who gets labeled a conservative today but lets not forget that he inspired Michael Collins). If you go out into the realms of genre fiction you find interesting authors like William Peter Blatty, Russell Kirk, Arthur Machen and Mark Samuels.
What Pauline Kael termed “The Catholic Imagination” always has been and always will be awful potent.
@ Felicia: Yeah the movie meant well and had some good things, particularly Stanley Tucci. I just don’t know if this is a book that was meant to translate.
I haven’t read The Godfather but I hear the focus kind of drifts a lot compared to the movie.
I’ve also heard that the last Harry Potter movie is better than the last book, although I’m behind on the movies. Since I was so dissatisfied with the last two books I wonder if I would feel the same way!
Well, I guess Moore hasn’t been in the news a lot lately, so I can sort of see where this probably came from But I think he should try to take up the Governor’s offer instead! I’m going to be in Atlanta over the holidays and I would make sure to pop into a shop there and grab a copy, “for the luls,” as the kids say!
I actually never read the book, but the movie of The Godfather is one of the best movies ever made and you don’t really hear people rave about the book in the same way. Anyone who read it care to set me straight?
This is wonderful! I may have to get an iPad to take advantage of it. What a great idea, thank you! Hopefully this doesn’t put too many dramaturgs out of work.
Two recent exceptions to the rule would be Shutter Island, which is equal to the book in most parts and has one final twist of the screw that makes the ending better.
The other would be Let Me In. Which is not only one of few times that the film is better than the book, but one of the few times the American remake is superior to the foreign original. All credit to Richard Jenkins, the man with the saddest eyes in the universe.
Chai… Achebe grow up. WTF? 1million Dollars for a name you also stole from W.B. Yeats and you refused? Claiming rights that suck. TFU there. Oh poor 50… It’s Ok sha. Make achebe chop him title. Nonsense. SMH
Walahi… Achebe grow up. WTF? 1million Dollars for a name you also stole from W.B. Yeats and you refused? Claiming rights that suck. TFU there. Oh poor 50… It’s Ok sha. Make achebe chop him title. Nonsense. SMH
What about the banning/suppression of Keeley Thomson: Demon Girl?
A lot of people keep talking about old books that aren’t seriously being threatened, when this one is being threatened right now in one of the biggest covert squelching efforts in modern history.
I technically only ‘read’ the audiobook version, but I think Jurassic Park and probably most of the intensely visual films are particularly apt to having this happen. Certain horror films, too…I’ve always heard Psycho is way better as a movie than as a book, and I think that’s a combination of it being a horror flick and a particularly excellent director!
And this might be a bit controversial, but I personally would rather watch the Lord of the Rings trilogy (extended edition!) than re-read the books, which I find pretty dry. I think Tolkien did some phenomenal world-building, the sort that still impacts fantasy to this day in a major way…but his writing is a bit tough for me to stick to!
Finding a title does stretch the brain, true. Just composing the title for an article or blog post is not easy, so it is much more difficult for a longer work.
My sister is in the process of getting her first novel published and she was asked to think up a few alternative titles. This whole process of finding a title is strange.
I consider Fitzgerald one of the three most important American writers of his generation. It’s ironic that he wasn’t more sensitive to ethnic slurs since he himself suffered from them as a relatively poor Irish boy at Princeton.
I’ve been hearing lots of buzz on the new release and I’m excited to pick this one up and add to our Shel Silverstein family library! What a lasting impression his work has had on us all…
Daniel, this is fascinating to me…I haven’t read any Silverstein as an adult but Where the Sidewalk Ends, Falling Up, and The Giving Tree were major classics of my childhood! I want to check out the new book and see what I think now that I’m (sort of) a grown-up
Meg @ A Bookish Affair posted on
September 21, 2011
I think that publishers should have some editing reign over the story but if their editing crosses over the line of actually changing fundamental parts of the story, it probably shouldn’t be done.
This is an amazing article about the prejudices faced by women in the world of gaming– and frankly, while written by a guy, it blows quite a few female-written articles on the same topic right out of the water.
@Gia, you’ve covered in my opinion when editors should step in regarding content. However publishers sometimes do have expertise in cover design, book titles, marketing stuff. I stress sometimes.
Im pretty sure there was not enough negotiation frm ’50′ to meet the terms of Achebe and so off went the deal. True African Icon treasure Respect over money.
Donna and Felicia, I’m curious– what kinds of things SHOULD an editor step up and suggest? Obviously grammar/spelling/structure/flow, but when you get into actual content, what IS appropriate for them to suggest changes to?
Common’s appearance on Jon Stewart was incredible. The controversy about Common’s invitation to the White House is mind-numbing but handled in classic Jon Stewart style. Absolutely hilarious.
As a writer who also has worked in publishing, there are times when publishers should step in–sometimes they do know what is best when it comes to sales. But overall, the publishing industry plays it safe, is too stuck on trends, and really needs to better embrace diversity. And well, publishers and authors usually don’t have collaborative relationships. They should.
I understand the point of publishing is to make money but this sounds a bit like “false advertising” to market something as chic lit when it is not. As far as the characters sexual orientation – how horrible if today, fictional characters are being put in the closet. I’m a bit shocked at this one and hope there’s a story behind the story; if not, yes, this crosses a line to be sure with publisher/editors. I think this just points out how critical the relationship between author and editor. Yes, money is the bottom line but there also needs to be respect and integrity in the process.
I saw the trailer for the upcoming movie based on this book (“John Carter”) and I’m really excited! It looks stunning! So I decided to snatch this book up (it’s free on the Kindle) and give it a try. I’m enjoying it a lot so far!
I personally think that this is a really complicated issue. After all, most publishers aren’t non-profit organizations; it’s their job to sell the most copies they can, and the author benefits from that too, assuming it’s a standard royalties-based package. So while I understand Courtney’s unhappiness about being packaged at ChickLit and respect her decision, it’s hard for me to blame the publisher and marketing team for their decision, too.
I’m horrified, however, at the change of a character’s sexual orientation. That article is a fascinating read (it also dives back into the past when authors might be asked to change a character’s race), and I personally think this is something that authors AND readers should come down against, hard!
The difference between the two is that Courtney’s issue was primarily about the /marketing/ of a book, whereas Smith and Brown’s problem had to do with actually changing the /content/ of the book. Editors are obviously there to improve a work, and again, I understand where they’re coming from…but I think this move crosses the line.
Daniel, for those of us who already have a Prime account (it pays for itself on the shipping, trust me!), it’s a particularly fun idea…especially since my household has two voracious readers!
That said, I’m most concerned about the impact on libraries– corporation will figure out their ways to profit. Perhaps smaller libraries will simply have to refocus themselves as places to go to read and participate in activities, like a reading-centric community center, and less on their book stock? I mean, really, if the problem is that no one is going to libraries for their physical books– which must be one of the major operating costs of the library –I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before a few of them experiment with shifting away from them somewhat.
It sounds scary to think of a library that’s not focused on books themselves, but do you think it could wind up being the future for all but the biggest metro libraries?
I actually think this is a great idea. The fee seems a bit steep but I have a feeling it’ll come down as more people sign up. Netflix worked brilliantly, so why not books?
I’m a bit of a traditionalist myself; having said that Amazon is wonderful way to order those books I have on my list. But, almost weekly I still head to my local indie bookstore to walk around, explore, talk with the staff and hear about their picks and see what authors are coming to town… it’s a treat for me and my daugther! Amazon, as great as they are with pricing and delivery, can’t provide that kind of experience!
This is definitely a book I’ll add to my shelf; what a powerful interview. And, how cool that one of his favs is The Four Agreements – a favorite of mine as well. Thanks for this interview.
Thanks for the head’s up. I’ve been meaning to check out Voices Of A Distant Star. Good to know he’s not just a flash in the pan. A bit of Ghibli influence is never a bad thing ; )
Of course! I wish the theater in Seattle where I saw it had been a little more packed. What a beautiful film!
Here’s one for you to keep an eye out for…it’s not available in the U.S. yet but it premiered at Otakon in Baltimore this past summer. The Japanese title is Hoshi o Ou Kodomo and it’s a fantasy adventure/drama. It’s mostly kid-friendly and it’s simply stunning. The director, Makoto Shinkai, is best-known for his near single-handed anime Voices of a Distant Star, but give him a staff and it turns out that he makes a phenomenal full-length film! A little Ghibli-derivative at times But beautiful and strongly-written. I interviewed Shinkai at Otakon as well and he’s young, thoughtful, and really loves the medium. He makes me hopeful for the medium’s future
Also, studio Madhouse is currently finishing up Kon’s last film, Yume-miru Kikai, so there will at least be one more sendoff for Kon, who passed on WAY too early.
Glad to see someone glad to see some love for Summer Wars. I hope that Hosada makes some more movies soon. After the death of Satoshi Kon there are far too few people making interesting anime.
On Writing is brilliant. I also love his columns in Entertainment Weekly…I haven’t subscribed to the mag in ages but I sometimes pick it up when I’m traveling, mostly for his column!
I have a love/bored to death relationship wit Stephen King. My sister was kind enough to let me read this story on her device (I do not yet own one) but I found it rather dull. King tends to be long winded and sometimes thinks he’s funnier than he really is. Don’t get me wrong, he has his moments, but this just isn’t one of them.
I don’t mind vampires changing over the years. Like other monsters, they represent our fears and these fears change over time too. Political fears, fears of disease, mental fears, sexual fears… I suspect the original vamps were created to represent the dark ages, the past out of which we had emerged, which we feared we could be drawn back into by the beasts that remain in us, in our blood – while today’s undead have more to do with sexuality. The beautiful dead of Twilight & other teen-oriented dramas focus on the fears of young people becoming adults, changes in their bodies, changes in their social lives, sexual expectations….
Check out the vampire cruise and ask them yourself! Do some “on the water” reporting! http://vampsatsea.com/
It looks like this cruise might appeal to the vampire traditionalist like you Dan!
This is the true story of Moby Dick, or at least the story Moby Dick was based on. You think you’re job sucks? Trying whaling. Well, don’t actually, because it’s a terrible thing, but read what these guys went through and ask yourself how willing you’d be to eat your friends.
I made the tragic mistake of reading the first book, and here’s my take.
The Twilight series is like eating a bag of cheese puffs. They have the obvious appealing qualities that are totally addictive, but have no substance whatsoever. You can go through a whole bag of cheese puffs and at the end you’re like, “Wow, I just ate a delicious bag of… nothing.”
Twilight is the literary equivalent of this. It has romance, and a bad boy, and teenage “nobody understands me” drama, and vampires, but has no real SUBSTANCE. 13 year old girls eat this stuff up for the same reason they eat reality TV up, it’s all the same thing. Meyer is smart; she’s writing for a specific audience and making millions, and there’s nothing wrong with that. We’ll just have to live with the single-handed ruining of vampire culture for the younger generation. Meanwhile, we’ll enjoy our fright night and ignore Sparkles McGee.
I agree though, I don’t understand the craze surrounding the movie especially. It’s absurd.
I have no problem with the fans – hey, it’s your choice what you like and don’t like. But the vampire belongs to all of us, and I will defend the malformed, murderous, snaggle-toothed variety any day of the week.
I think the stories would be popular if they were zombies, witches, warlocks, soothsayers, robots, aliens, cyborgs, or any other type of supernatural being. It’s the kind of young adult love story that 14 year old girls can’t get enough of. Besides, wizards were taken.
I think the “Twihards” get a bad rap– most of them are either young girls (in which case, why all the hate? Young girls and boys like all sorts of “awful” stuff, who cares?) and/or are part of a self-sustaining fan community with members as devoted as, say, Trekkies. So why are Trekkies just funny but Twilight fans outright detested? I just don’t get the sheer vitriol of it all!
As for the writing, I’d just call it average. Honestly, it’s only maybe a half-step below Harry Potter in sheer artfulness– both utilize a very straight-forward and simple style. The difference comes in the complexity of plot and the layers of meaning, both of which I think Rowling offers in spades compared to Meyers.
On the other hand I’ve read an AWFUL lot of garbage over the years, so maybe my scale is a little wonky
Finally, someone who gets me! Amen sister, it’s time the vampire from Salem’s Lot or some of the guys from Fright Night took a trip down to Sissy Town and laid waste to these wannabe Nosferatu.
Vampires are mean and scary and will suck your blood until you die (if they don’t turn you yourself into a mean scary bloodsucking fiend). If they ARE good and don’t drink human blood, it’s because they were cursed with a soul or have a chip planted in their head.
REAL vampires are soulless, have no reflection, hate garlic (no Italian food, bummer), burst into flame if the sun hits them, do NOT get anybody pregnant (um, hello, they’re dead), but they’re totally allowed to be broody if they’ve been cursed with a soul or totally pissed off if they have a chip in their head.
Also, that sissy Twilight vampire wears freakin’ DOCKERS. If Dracula himself showed up, and he was wearing Dockers, I’d laugh him back to Yuppieburg, Dorksylvania. Fortunately, though, Dracula has impeccable taste.
ANYway, this whole “vampires are cool” thing is just going to get people really dead when they actually do meet a vampire.
Also, the writing in those books is crap. That is all.
Gia – yeah, with quantity you lose quality, I agree with that, but sometimes you find gold amongst the trash. If it weren’t for the ability to buck the system, to say to hell with the established means for creating artistic success, we might never have had the Ramones.
I haven’t read this yet– Gaiman’s been pretty hit-or-miss with me (loved Neverwhere, Sandman, and most of his short stories; thought Stardust was pretty ‘meh;’ and could not get into American Gods). Should I pick this up?
I will say that by and large Amazon has been great for the sheer volume of stuff I read! I went through a couple of years where I hardly read any books for fun, mostly just graphic novels or re-reading past favorites. Then I got a Kindle
Recently saw Brendan Constantine read at a night of poetry at the Getty Museum. Among a line-up of some of my favorite contemporary poets, he contributed my favorite piece of the evening, so I bought this. And oh, Brendan Constantine, how excellent you are when you are at your best. Sometimes you lose me, it’s true. But when I’m with you, I’m nowhere else (and for someone as easily distracted as me, that’s saying something.) I was literally reading some of these poems out loud at the bus stop. There are significant portions of Los Angeles that think I am a crazy person because of you. But I don’t even care, because every word was worth it. Also, some of the best section titles I’ve ever seen: “The House of the World”, “Crimewave” and (my favorite) “Hyenas in the Temples of Pleasure.” If you are a fan of contemporary poetry, you should probably pick this up as soon as humanly possible. Really, I’m doing you a favor.
As a side note, I’ll likely be reviewing this book for the next issue of Muzzle Magazine. But I’d love other peoples’ thoughts on some of the pieces in it. Let me know if you happen to get it, as I’d really like to mull over a few of the poems with other humans!
I don’t know much about the book business, per se. However, I think Amazon has been fantastic for students. It’s really broken up the textbook market. I saved so much money in grad school by buying my books on amazon – both new and used.
As for the ebook market as I’m something of a traditionalist myself. I like feeling the book in my hand, writing in the margins, tabbing up the pages etc. Maybe you can do similar things with an ebook now?
As for Borders, you have to keep up with the big boys. Barnes and Noble came out with an ereader, as much as I am not inclined to buy one, Borders should have done the same.
Daniel, that leads me to wonder…if it becomes easier and cheaper for writers to step around traditional publishing, the role of bloggers and sites like inReads will certainly become considerably more important in terms of helping people sort through the garbage to find the gems, as it were!
Not that traditional publishers have done a *flawless* job of holding back the floodgates, but considering how big most publishers’ “slush piles” get, you have to wonder what will happen to the state of literature if those books’ authors self-publish them, often without the benefit of so much as an editor (to make things cheaper)!
…Actually I guess that’s sort of what the “fanfiction” world is like. Sure, there are some well-written stories out there based on other authors’ works, but there’s so much poorly-written junk!
I think the publishing world is going down the same path as the music industry. More and more writers are embracing the DIY work ethic, realizing how incredibly difficult it is to ‘get published’ by a big house and taking matters into their own hands. Amazon is giving these writers the tools they need to get their work out there and I think that will ensure continued success. Those writers who work hard, promote their work and take advantage of new technologies will be successful. But it’s going to take some time.
I’ve been obsessively following the Kindle Daily Deal for the last week and have bought several of those books, usually $1.99 to $2.99 (regular prices ranging from $12.99 to $22.99). It’s great!
By and large, I think Amazon makes it easier for product producers (including authors!) to reach consumers…and I think it makes it a bit harder for them to make a lot of profit. But I won’t pretend to be enough of a business expert to know how that’s going to play out!
As for Borders, I’m sad for the store’s employees. I also have a certain nostalgia for the store; Borders (and then-buyer Kurt Hassler) are widely credited with bringing manga (Japanese comics) to mass audiences, which I have benefited from greatly over the years! I remember being what is now known as a “hobotaku” (a kid who sits in the store reading the manga, usually on the floor) before there was such a term, in my local Borders almost every Saturday.
I’m sad the chain is effectively gone, but I think that it made some poor business choices in a tough market, and I don’t feel that the company has been unfairly manhandled or anything, either.
You mention that Americans read very few books and that the Kindle’s ability to hold 3500 books is overkill for just about everyone.(I live in South Africa and people read even fewer books there!)
What you do not mention is why anyone would buy an e reader in the first place.For example why would a person who reads one book a year buy a kindle?Common sense tells me that s/e would merely be making a fashion statement.
Now why did I buy a kindle? I read about 10 or more popular to serious science books(eg Roger Penrose’s “Parallel Universes” Steve Hawking’s “Grand Design”. Is a kindle merely a fashion statement in my case. I do not think so! I travel a lot and I do not read the books sequentially but simultaneously.Need I say more?
I am frankly not interested in the debate whether ebooks will ever replace “real books”.There is no doubt though that ebooks are convenient to people who read several books a year and do not want to be lugging several physical books around.
I have a kindle before the ads. I would still pay the higher price not to have ads. I don’t mind the ones at the back telling of the authors books but not regular ads.
I love my ereader and one of the best things about it is all the free books I have gotten from indie authors just starting out. Since they are free I would not be opposed to the author making a little money from ads as long as they are at the beginning or end of book. However, if I am paying for a book I would be pissed to have ads included.
I would just like to point out that since submitting this column, I’ve bought two more ebooks at a greatly discounted rate. Let The Right One In for 4.99 and Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy for 1.99.
Neither was of course directed to me by Barnes And Noble. I stumbled upon Let The Right One In, and AMAZON let me know about the discount on Bonhoeffer. Hi-Ho!!
I love Amazon, always will, always the best prices without the hassle (no coupons, going to the mall at certain times, etc). I rarely walked into Borders, the prices for CDs were outrageous, Borders killed itself, and lastly, all those crying over BOrders demise, where were you when Borders killed so many mom and pop indies book stores?
Oh yes, I forgot–my favorite thing (NOT) is the “This book is obvious;y self-published” when the book is not self-published, and the criticism of the edit. No book is perfect. Ihave a second edition Charles Dickens where he aologizes for the mistakes in hos first edition. Don’t people realize they are attacking a [erson’s livlihood? Writing isn’t a hobby. It is a profession. They shouldn’t buy from Amazon if they don’t want a surprise. If they walked into a bookstore they could presumedly get what they want.
Amazon directs readers away from books–I believe through this system. Reviews of my own books that don’t even come close to accurately describing a book are ridiculus–at one point some so-called reviewer decided akl the good reviews were written by me and got Amazon to remove them all—then buyers were sent by this person to a cmpetitor’s book—Now no book is perfect and Amazon tells publishers and authors it is okay to have friends, family, employees review books–but this is not true–In fact, Amazon in giving free books is encouraging this sort of thing–what I mean is the purpose seems to be to drive readers to other books, and they only do this when a small publisher starts to really sell– Hmmmmm—- It appears Amazon really is manipulating the market and the sales and all is not as it seems. I cringe now when I get good reviews, because I know the one star reviews will follow!
Her mother *has* read this, I’m friends with her on Amazon and Facebook Great blog post, Alice, I hadn’t heard about your book, but I’ll have to check it out
Autobio comics were exactly how I was able to get into reading comics. I’d really recommend ellerbisms (http://www.ellerbisms.com/?p=15), a free autobio webcomic.
Great fantasy novel. It left me wanting more and I can’t wait for news on the next one. The transformation and abilities of the character were pretty cool.
Great article! I would wager that at least 60% of my writing career/ steady work came from introductions to editors/agents from other writers. And without a network of supportive writer-friends to read drafts, give advice, share contacts, and let me vent on rough days, I don’t think I would have stayed a writer. And I have a handful of close friends–some in LA and some in New York–who I originally met in writers groups that I saw advertised on… craigslist.
I read the Sherlock Holmes book and it was a very nice experience. It took some pages to get used to but then it was easy to do. I think this might be good for improving your reading speed. If you set the speed at a little faster than you’re comfortable with and turn off the automatic speed function you push yourself to follow the marker even if you miss a few words here and there. I’m gonna try it because I don’t read that fast. I’m definately looking forward to new title releases. I think their trailer is laughable though. The power of six doesn’t seem to be available in my country. That sucks.
I actually don’t know if I agree with you entirely–superstition is a hoax insofar as it does not have any scientific or physical consequence. However, if certain rituals succeed in calming the mind, however irrational, and that place of calm inspires one to write with more ease and inspiration, is it really a hoax? The light of a candle, the size of a font, or the shadows of a lonely night are not responsible for fine writing, no; but they are responsible for the effect they have on the writer, and are therefore indirectly connected to the writing process. People are irrational creatures; we have emotional and spiritual connections to stimulus and rituals. Certain atmospheres, locations, sounds, objects, and whatever else–serve to calm the mind. We study in libraries, we listen to fast music when we exercise, and we appreciate the aesthetic value a vase of flowers can bring to the room. None of these things are *responsible* for the effect, but they effect us nonetheless, and I’m not sure how that’s so different from superstitions of this sort. Unless you’re mistaking superstitions as routes to quick-success; the writer is responsible for his or her work, but also responsible for creating environments that will allow him or her to work well. I suppose superstition becomes a problem when one begins to rely on it more than oneself, or when the writing process becomes more about the superstition/ritual than the actual writing, which you seemed to indicate.
For some reason, I’ve never been able to get through King Lear and this might be exactly the medium I need to get into it. On the other had I hated when one of my favorite sci-fi classics, Ender’s Game, was turned into a graphic novel.
Wow. I hadn’t ever considered getting superstitious about writing. I write when I feel it- when I absolutely can’t do anything else because the ideas are flowing through me like a rushing, roaring river. I write when I am sad, I write when I am happy, I write when I’m exhausted. I write when I don’t want to write. And usually, what I find is that I quickly get into it and all of the stress of life melts away.
Of course, now that you mentioned superstitions, I will be thinking about them. Before I know it, I am sure I will have created some crazy ones of my own.:)
Branding is, obviously, the result of a writer’s hard work. The problem for an author without his brand yet built, is that the reading public seems to no longer want to search for a new voice with a new story to tell. They seem to be satisfied with that same voice telling the same kind of tale, much like a TV series drones onward week after week, telling the same tale again and again with different clothes. On the other hand, the ebook world is affording me and other writers a chance at being seen and heard via low prices which entice a reader to say, ‘what is there to lose, paying 99 cents or two dollars for a new writer’s try at the brass ring\?’ We have some big successes, as you say, Ms. Hocking, Mr. Locke and others, nevermind whether you like their work or not. Obviously, many do, and I hope my own novels, working on number 3 getting into the ebook world at present, will ring the bell for lots of readers. thanks for your thoughts.
I love any book by Marquez, and this was no exception. It was a perfect one day read, and even in such a short book Marquez was able to develop fascinating and believable characters and relationships. Loved it.
Ugh, I hate being spoiled, even about stupid books. I was spoiled walking out of Borders by a mother/daughter talking about My Sister’s Keeper. Not exactly a big mystery novel, but still frustrating.
I don’t even like it when the back of a book tells me the premise is that X happens, but when the book starts, X hasn’t happened yet. I spend the beginning just waiting for what I know is going to happen to occur, just so I can get started on the fresh information.
But, I’m a horrible spoiler for the end of a chapter. If I am on the next to the last page and the end is on the page I can see, I’m totally going to read it before I get to it. I’ve had to read with my hand over the next page, just so I don’t ruin it for myself.
THE ABSTINENCE TEACHER is the only Perrotta book I’ve read so far. In that book I found, as you’ve noted, sharp prose and a letdown in the third act. Still, it was a worthwhile read overall and I’m going to check out the excerpt of THE LEFTOVERS.
I like being surprised but I can see how knowing an ending wouldn’t necessarily ruin a book if there is more than just a surprise ending to carry the book.
Maybe if Dr. Wm. Stuart Halsted hadn’t done Cocaine, he wouldn’t have been so paranoid about sterility, germs, and proper procedure in the Operating Theatre …
I enjoyed the Manga Shakespeare version of “Much Ado About Nothing.” That play is very familiar to me and illustrations helped me see some lines in a new light.
Amy’s use of cocaine and the role is played in her demise has been well documented. But I have read an in depth article in which her mother states that Amy had problems with recklessness from a very early age, before alcohol or drugs were a factor. And while brilliant Amy had trouble in school. This leads me to believe she had some other mental and emotional disorders that remained undiagnosed. Until we start looking deeper and treating the cause of drug and alcohol abuse, people will continue to abuse themselves in whatever ways they can find.
Let’s stick to fiction for the moment, since that’s what most book clubs favor. I have been in a mixed-gender, mixed-age book group for three years now, and the one thing we have in common now (though not before our trek through the canonical, the highly-hyped, and the out-of-nowhere) is that you should never, ever believe what the legacy publishing houses say. They back the books they paid a lot for, and frankly a lot of acquisitions editors deserve to be fired. Recent duds, all frighteningly overwrought and overwritten: Matterhorn, Freedom, The Surrendered. Recent novels-approached-with-an-open-mind that nearly all of us wanted to hurl across the room with great force: The Privileges, Mr. Peanut. The sole source of recommendations that worked for all of us turned out to be the Best Novels of the Year lists from the Washington Post’s late lamented Book World, and there we gleaned some terrific fiction for grownups, notably Unfinished Desires and Deep Creek.
Thank you to David and Stephen for catching a careless grammatical error and thank you to WordPress for making it so easy to fix! Sorry to have detracted from the message of the piece and appreciate the chance to fix it for other inReaders.
“…others on the list have made the most of the cache attached to their names.”
That should be “cachet” rather than “cache”. In recent years, the two words seem to be increasingly confused with each other, beginning it seems, with members of the military in Iraq and Afghanistan referring to captured “weapons caches” and mistakenly pronouncing “cache” as “cachet”.
Some interesting observations, but one glaring grammatical error jumped out at me while reading. (A shame, really, since it somewhat overshadowed your message for me.)
You wrote, “… he and some of the others on the list have made the most of the CACHE attached to their names.”
Shouldn’t that be “cachet,” as in reputation or esteem? “Cache” means a treasure trove or a temporary storage area for computer data.
Thanks for all of the great comments, guys. I don’t think Amazon is good or bad–but I do think that we should encourage competition in the e-book market–80% of anything sounds like a monopoly–and I am glad to hear from so many small publishers who are doing just that.
For the youngsters I think that the Riordan books and the Rowling books merit their fame. My kids can’t wait to read them and this enjoyment can’t only be a result of marketing. As a mystery fan, I was disappointed by the Steig Larsson book and had to struggle to get through the first one. I think this one coasted in on a wave of hype.
J. Nelson Leith–Great point about the continuous feedback loop. As you can see I was cautious about not mentioning recent reading disappointments since some of them were well-buzzed and well-loved.
I fully sympathize with your experience with “much-anticipated” books. Sometimes, I am completely baffled by a book’s success.
I believe an internet-driven increase in the speed of positive feedback loops has a lot to do with success these days, particularly when everyone is trying to pile onto a buzzing bandwagon. Readers might not be responding so much to the book itself, but to the social implications of liking/disliking the book.
I aspire to be a successful publisher but with the industry like it is and the economy crashing around my soon to graduate ears I am more than aware of the need to find a ‘proper job’
My take on your commentary about Amazon is- Make Hay While the Sun Shines. Belatedly, I am learning the Kindle and other e-reader systems, prepping my many novels for them, 2 in the system so far. A long life in business, from franchise ownership to real estate to selling mortgages before our “Big Bust” has taught me that nothing lasts, so I better “Strike While the Iron is Hot.” Amazon has filled a huge void for writers and readers, so, say thanks, use it and roll with changes when they happen. That is how business and real life happen. thanks for your article.
I think this system allows the PUBLIC to decide what is good and what is not good. The internet is just a way to magnify word of mouth advertising. If a book is poorly written, it will get bad reviews and won’t sell. Authors need to maintain the quality of their books by writing EXCELLENT stories. Word of mouth will kill the badly written books.
Back in the days of pulp fiction, authors cut their teeth on the short story. I believe that the short story will return now and this is an excellent way to build a following and to become better and better as a writer.
More online content (short stories) = higher ranking in the search engines and greater exposure to fans.
The most important people win (the authors and readers).
Booksellers will have to adapt to survive, though physical books will never go out entirely IMHO. I think ebooks just create more readers, expanding the market.
Agents need to change what they offer as a service to authors. If an agent wants to survive, they will learn how to MARKET ebooks. I’d gladly give an agent 15% of my sales if the agent knew anything about marketing (few people do).
Just a few thoughts.
One day soon, I’ll have to write an ebook on how to market books online….
Re: your comment that, “Anyone can contribute to the [Amazon] site, making separating the good from the bad difficult” and “In the future, could Amazon serve as the e-book’s gatekeeper, stepping into territory once controlled by traditional publishers?”
IndieReader (www.indiereader.com), the essential consumer guide to self-published books and the people who write them, was launched specifically to provide another venue for people looking for independent news and reviews on indie books.
As an author and self-publisher I use Amazon only as a seller, and would enjoy a greater profit for my books if people bought them directly from me; but they don’t. Instead, they copy down the details and then look for a lower price on Amazon. I do not host Amazon links on my site for that reason. I do not feel the need to boost my competitors’ reach by doing so. As for sales at whatever percentage of royalties, the frequent glitches and dropoffs in service on Amazon and KDP should be a cause for concern, not celebration. Amazon does whatever it wants whenever it wants and never keeps its sellers in the loop. It behaves like it’s the only market in town; and its customers don’t care what happens to us authors.
Publishing Kindle editions of our books with Amazon has been a great boon to my small publishing firm. We price our Kindle editions in the $3.95 and $4.95 range, and have enjoyed considerable success/remuneration. We’re very happy with both the sales and the publishing interface. – Ed Renehan, Managing Director, New Street Communications, LLC
Great article! And I think it’s a great jumping off point for a broader dialogue on how readers DO have the power to collectively demand that Amazon operate more ethically and fairly with the other players in the book business.
As an author of a book with Simon and Schuster and the author of an ebook that I recently published through Kindle Direct, I think volumes could be written on why Amazon, in its current conception, is bad for book publishing. They short-change everyone, whether it’s indie authors, small publishers, and large publishers. Their reader reviews are often vitriolic and amazon takes so much of the elegance out of buying books. But that’s not the major problem:
We can’t look at Borders and independent bookstores closing and say, “Oh, the economy is bad” or “Oh, people don’t read anymore.” Amazon has such a grip on the book buying market that they can tell book publishers what discount they require on books–whether it’s Random House selling a highly-anticipated hardcover or a first-time indie author publishing her first ebook. Publishers often see their profit projections decimated when amazon requires a $15 discount on every copy of a big book that was supposed to save the publisher’s quarter… and no other bookstore can require–or compete with!–those discounts.
In terms of Amazon’s work with indie authors, taking 30%–or worse, 65%!–of sales for offering place to sell an ebook (with zero technical and marketing support) is a total rip-off. When we talk about Amanda Hocking selling 9,000 ebooks a day, it sounds like she must be a megamilionaire, but she’s actually only getting $.35 on her books’ $.99 list price. The 35% commission level for books under $.99 is shameful!
Amazon is a major company and they won’t voluntarily say, “Sure, we’ll stop trying to dominate this industry and cut into our profit margins so other businesses can thrive.”
We need more awareness–and outrage–among readers, writers, and everyone who loves books about what amazon is doing to writers and publishers that makes being in the book business even more complicated and unlucrative in these untenable times.
Meanwhile, this is ridiculous. One website will never be the “gatekeeper” for online publishing. It only takes moderate internet search skills to find online books elsewhere. Good books will get found by one of the billions of people on the internet and word will get spread, no matter where it is.
Secondly, online writing isn’t only going to be about getting people to pay before they read your work. With free downloads so easy to find, the concept of supporting the artists you love is probably one of the major reasons to pay for a book at all, and anyone who thinks about it should realise that a direct donation is more cost effective for that goal.
My point being, online publishers are nothing more than a stepping stone towards cutting out the middle man between authors and consumers.
Maybe the first two paragraphs read like that, but afterwards it swings in the other direction, and seems like an attempt to make Amazon sound evil. I mean, this quote is clearly not pro Kindle: “… in creating this new world for publishing under the umbrella of one website, have we exchanged one boss for another?”
Unless you mean that you think it’s intentionally written with poor arguements to make people interested in Kindle Direct? Even if that’s the case, I think the article scored a hit with the advertising thing… I mean, I haven’t looked at many Kindle books so I haven’t seen any of these fake books that it mentioned, but if it’s true, that is indeed pretty awful.
A disclaimer: Snake Nation Press does not publish e-books.
I read a Tweet recently that readers are the only ones benefiting from the e-book bonanza. It seems the pirating of music is small, compared to how easy it is to steal e-books. I must admit, we saw that coming and really have not been concerned with entering the fray. Amazon has not been a friend to the small press, so why would they be a friend to the individual writer?
As someone who is contemplating publishing with Amazon, I agree with this-
“Whether or not writers like Amazon’s policies, most do not have the fan base or the finances to shun it completely.”
I interviewed C.M. Mayo for this website and she formed a niche publishing company of her own to produce e-books and specialty paper books, but many authors will turn to Amazon because the profit margin they offer is hard to beat.
My thought is that since Amazon is one of many avenues for publication, an author can be selective about what they publish with Amazon. One of the authors interviewed for this story indicated that he will be selling some things on his own website.
Amazon has had issues with people repurposing the content of others and selling it and breaking down the barriers does mean that there is a lot more content out there, but that does not mean people will be unable to find books they will enjoy.
We are all in new territory here, but any new frontier only stays unstructured for so long…so I wonder if, as you note, we really want Amazon to be the gatekeeper for e-books?
The headline is very misleading. It suggests information that Amazon isn’t playing fair with the authors. Instead, the article reads more like a commercial for the Kindle Direct program. I call shenanigans.
Vic at Jane Austen’s World posted on
August 17, 2011
While I like to read the occasional spin off, I prefer going back to Jane Austen and biographies about her life. There are outstanding authors, Lynn Shepherd being one of them. Murder at Mansfield Park placed an interesting twist to a novel that even many Austen afficionados have difficulty liking.
Well I can certainly appreciate that Jason. And would that I had a hindsight time machine (would that we all) I would certainly change the word “muted” at the very least. Nothing that has provoked this much discussion could be called that.
I appreciate where you are coming from and thank you for taking the time to discuss your work. I very much look forward to what comes next.
I never said horror people voted unanimously. I said your characterization that horror fans’s response was muted at best, hostile at worst is wrong. Then i gave you evidence to back it up. I never called you malicious or questioned your professionalism or said you were raining on my parade. What can i saw, Bryce? I just didn’t do that. Frankly, i find your response awfully defensive. Where we disagree is that you think your statement that the response from horror folk was hostile or muted is founded and supported with sufficient evidence. I don’t. And i wonder if the new evidence i presented has changed your mind at all.
I do agree that my book does mix reporting and criticism, and while i think you engaged with it on the latter, what i tried to do here is try and clarify my intentions with the former. The rest of your criticisms i appreciate, i really do. I respect your opinion, and the more criticism and debate, the better. And now, im afraid, a deadline looms so must go finish a review. All the best, jz
That said I look forward to reading The Naked And The Undead as soon as possible. And will take the opportunity to tip my hat to one horror scholar I forgot to mention, Tim Brayton of the superlative Antagony & Ecstasy.
Jason you’re telling me that Horror fans and press are a diverse group with wildly divergent opinions, all of which voted in a unanimously positive block. I’m sorry but those are two contradictory arguments. Though I have to admit that characterizing the dissenting opinion as “a few of my friends” rankles. I can assure you that I wasn’t hanging out with some buddies behind a theater before turning to one and saying “I’m going to screw up Zinoman’s parade!” I gauged the opinions of the horror community based on the reviews I encountered and the opinions I heard expressed by horror fans and called it like I saw it. You can of course disagree with what I said, and as I already conceded there have been plenty of positive reviews. But there was nothing malicious in my approach, and as I already pointed out it’s not like I just made these reviews and opinions up. I gave quotes and cited sources, so questioning my professionalism seems a bit uncalled for.
As for the pre ’68 Horror, I think you walk the line between reportage and criticism in it. Sometimes it’s the filmmakers but just as often you are clearly giving your own opinion. Which obviously you have the right to it’s your book. As well as the right to “defend it to the death.” if you so choose. Just as I have the right to say that the films are more sophisticated, both stylistically and thematically, than you give them credit for and that your book talks about them in generalizations that I feel are unwarranted. As you said, not talking about something is not the same as denigrating them but there are such things as sins of omission and I believe that your book commits a few. I have to say I was particularly surprised to find no mention of The Witchfinder General in the text, as it was as sure a work of new horror as has been made, but made entirely from “Old Horror” Iconography. Especially as it starred Vincent Price, who you present as the standard bearer for musty Old Horror. How’s that for world’s colliding?
There were other things as well, like when you’re listing off the old horror stars who were dying at the end of the sixties, and included Lon Chaney. Who died in 1930. I’m presuming this was a typo and you were referring to Lon Chaney Jr., but he joined the choir invisible in 1973, some half decade after the time period you were referencing. It was omissions and generalizations such as these that I felt hurt the text, not just your opinion.
Like I said, I certainly do respect the work you put into this, I gave the book a hearty thumbs up as a work of film history and a discussion starter. And I certainly can’t argue with results. But my complaints were neither unfounded or unsupported.
Bryce,
I am not going to deny that i love the horror films from this era more than any other. I do and as a grumbling, not-at-all boosterish horror fan, that’s my right to stake an opinionated claim and then defend it to the death. But where i think you misunderstand me is that this book began not as a work of criticism, but as a work of reporting informed by a critical point of view. And what i discovered from talking to the directors of this period is that THEY saw the Old Horror as campy and not scary and out of date. And that THEY made movies in reaction to Vincent Price and Hammer. Some of them also loved those movies, but when i talk about what karloff represented to Peter B, my main goal is to try to explain how they movies got made the way they did. And my opinion, based on talking to directors, is that they set out to do something new and take horror in a different direction. To properly understand that shift, i wanted to map what they viewed as the horror scene then. That’s more important than what i think, because i didn’t make Last House on the Left. Craven did. Now maybe he isn’t the best critic of his own work, but i think on the ground reporting is a valuable tool to understanding the genre. That said, do i think that Alien and Texas Chainsaw Massacre are scarier than Freaks? Do i think Last House is more unsettling? Yes and yes. You can disagree and we can battle it out. As i say in the book, fear is as subjective as beauty.
As for horror fans, i know what you’re saying and i probably felt the same way before writing this book and reading reviews. But what i have found by reading scores of sites and magazine is a tremendous diversity of opinion and far deeper thinking than what i found in the major paper reviews. I also think the distinction between horror and nonhorror is not so clear. Glenn kenny may be a horror fan but he reviews everything. Laura Miller is a book critic for Salon but she is as smart about horror as anyone, and her review of my book, which includes praise and criticism, demonstrates that. The fact that Stacie Ponder (whose work i admire) and a few other of your friends didn’t like the book only proves my point. If you google search reviews, you will find that your characterization of the horror press’s response is straight-up wrong, no question about it. That doesn’t mean some people didn’t hate the book. They did. But as someone who loves a good critical spat, i wouldn’t have it any other way.
Add to your reading list Cynthia Freeland’s The Naked and the Undead, the best academic book on horror i’ve read in a long time. best, jason
And while I’m tipping my hat to my must read writers on the Horror Genre better mention Tim Lucas, Kim Newman, Bill Ryan’s “31 Days Of Slash” and of course Stephen King’s Danse Macabre. All essential reading for any horror fan.
I can certainly understand what you are saying and you make good points.
First though I want to say that I have to stand by what I say about the bias the book takes against Pre ’68 Horror films. You’re absolutely correct that omitting the study of films and filmmakers alone wouldn’t be denigration but as your thesis tends to describe “old horror” in terms of camp and gimmicks, as kids stuff. With phrases like “Karloff represented the cobwebs of a spooky castle, cheap advertising campaigns, the lurching monster-in other words old horror.” And “Romero mocks the conventions of the Old Horror movie as betraying any sense of reality.” You are criticizing the films implicitly if not explicitly and in a way I simply felt wasn’t accurate. I bet most people today would find Freaks tougher watch than Last House On The Left (Which I think Stephen King summed up nicely as “Abbot And Costello Meet The Rapists”.) And I think Val Lewton certainly made more than “modest Freudian films.”
That said, I can certainly understand your position on the auteur theory, and of course with the extensive research you’ve done you’re more than earned it. It’s just the sudden right turn that was taken at the DePalma chapter that through me. As I will admit it is mostly the Hitchcock material that inspired “The Couch” comment. (
As for the reviews, it is true that I made my comment based mostly on dialogue with other horror fans. I try to keep up with as much horror literature as I can (My go to girl on that front remains Stacie Ponder, with a side of Drew McWeeney, and some Scott Weinberg as well.) but I will cite Bill Ryan, and the afore mentioned Glenn Kenny, just to demonstrate what I’m saying isn’t unfounded. I would go ahead and add The Deadly Doll’s House Of Horror Nonsense to your list of popular reviews. In hindsight mixed would be a more appropriate word than muted. Though I think I said what I meant to the first time out which was merely “curious” and in reference as much to the positive response by the mainstream.
That said, I will also stand by my comment that horror fans are a booster happy bunch. As I meant it as a sincere compliment. What other group of fandom is more or less self sustaining? Just look at “Before The Mask’s” Facebook Page, I’ve seen horror fans rally around something they really love too many times for it to be otherwise. They might not always succeed (The swift retraction of Hatchet II from AMC theaters springs to mind) but they always give it their best shot. If Attack The Block goes nation wide it will be because of them. There’s a lot of truth in this Faracci article (http://www.chud.com/19627/chud-quick-list-6-reasons-why-horror-fans-make-the-best-film-fans/
Anyway I certainly have an enormous amount of respect for what you’ve accomplished, the amount of work you put into it and your passion. I was sincere when I made the compliment about starting a dialogue with people who usually wouldn’t. If we disagree in a some key places in our understanding of the genre that’s natural. Hopefully you understand the spirit of debate it is intended in.
Bryce,
I liked your list of five movies I did not mention in Shock Value – every one worthy of its own book. And I’m not sure why you think I am denigrating film-makers who I don’t mention. The book is not a survey of horror movies in the 20th century. It’s a reported book ( i sure tried to have every interview for an extended period of time although it was usually in chairs, not couches) about a discrete period in horror that I do believe was a golden age, but that does not mean i don’t believe that great horror wasn’t made before or after. As for the auteur theory, to clarify: I find it useful, but through my reporting, I came to the conclusion that these movies were often much more works of collaboration than they have been given credit for.
But what’s most strange is your assertion that the response among horror fans has been muted or hostile. We could compare what we’ve heard from friends and movie people but that’s silly. This is a book that has received dozens of reviews, most of them from the horror press. You don’t mention any of them. So the evidence is easy to find. Check out Fangoria or Bloody Disgusting or Freddy in Space or Monsterland or Retro Slashers or any of the many, many others (Shock Value FB page has close to them all). I disagree with you that they are a “notoriously booster happy bunch.” I have been hugely impressed by the quality of thought and prose of the reviews from the horror press. You would benefit from taking a look.
I’m one of those rare people who doesn’t love Stephen King, except for Salem’s Lot. I’m a vampire fan and I saw the TV movie which led me to the book many years ago. It features an excellent cast of characters and really brings the vampire myth into everyday life. Can’t say I’m crazy about the current cover of the book though, what’s that all about?
I’ve read a few of them and some deserve the praise, but I can’t recommend all of those that I’ve read. Interesting if you enjoyed Catcher in the Rye, unassigned. Let us know if Catcher still appeals to you years later.
I don’t think I’ve read any of the “overrated” classics, other than Catcher in the Rye. I enjoyed it in high school, though I don’t believe I had to read it for a class. I may have, I just have a bad memory. But now that it’s gotten so much flack, I think I have to read it again.
That’s an excellent point. That being said having read the second book, it makes Grossman’s structure make a bit more sense. And I will confirm that the sequel is an immense improvement.
@ Alex: It’s not so much that I refuse to take a chance on self published stuff. I’ve heard great things about Maps And Legends and am hoping to try it out. It’s just a matter of time.
That said, I think even this has problems. The graphic novel section on the Nook Bookstore is a mess, same kind of shovel ware problem. It’s almost impossible to browse with all the detritus that ends up in there. And the nook is just too small to read comics on without the benefit of pinch and pull. I tried downloading The Oatmeal’s book on there and it was it literally unreadable.
@ Gia: Well Barnes And Noble has been making a point to do everything in house. So I’m not that surprised they didn’t go with comixology. It’d just be nice if someone in said house had a clue about what they were trying to do.
With regards to yaoi, it’s sad, but for the most part that’s the only genre that’s heavily embraced digital release. A few publishers in the U.S. are now working with iOS releases (Yen Press, Viz Media), but that’s about it, and probably is legitimately not Nook/B&N’s fault.
But for American comics? No clue why they wouldn’t go with ComiXology.
Bryce, a shame you’re not willing to take a chance on the self-published stuff. In Maps & Legends is WONDERFUL and is doing really well on the Nook, and I also have VALENTINE in ePub form in three languages. The Nook is actually incredibly easy to publish on…
I liked this book quite a bit, although I agree that it seemed underdone and overstuffed at times. I remember thinking when I first read it that it was the rare fantasy novel that should have been longer or even broken up into more books (it features three pretty distinct acts and I think would have played well as a trilogy). That said, I haven’t read the sequel yet, which I’ve heard good things about, so maybe some of the first book’s problems are due to set-up he wanted to get out of the way quickly.
@ASRAI: I accounted for the fact that “the average reader doesn’t give a damn about [presentation]“. I think it’s unfortunate that we don’t respect a work of literature as a holistic presentation rather than something that can just be converted into data, but that’s another post.
“Cheaper book costs, means cheaper books, means more buyers.” You’ve just reduced literature to a numbers game. Unless you’re a fledgling publisher, I won’t tell you how depressed that makes me.
@WILLIAM SCOTT It was a bit of both. Theorists–smarter than any of us–posit that the book-qua-art exists as the ENTIRE presentation; not just the text. It’s referenced by a philosophy called ‘Essentialism’. What depresses me is that the reading public forcefully eschews this artistic product in favor of easily digestible e-ink. There exists no art in the world that can be converted onto a new medium and still be considered art. A picture you see on your computer of a painting is not art, but a representation of art. The same goes for a book.
The difference is, however, that people don’t seem to consider the ‘book’, art. If we had “e-versions” of an art gallery, no one would argue the Rembrants were the same quality of art on the device. It’s a cheap facsimile! The fact that the same discussion isn’t being held about e-readers more frequently is shocking.
You aren’t technically “losing too much” in terms of information on the e-reader. However, simply making this designation admits that you’re only concerned about information, and not the art. E-readers, syllogistically, reduce art to information. The words are still there, but as any literary theorist will tell you, the art is not.
Hit up the young adult section of your local library. If you haven’t read the Hunger Games trilogy, City of Glass or one of the many other series/books out there you’re missing out. And while you’re at it, go ahead and reread Jane Eyre or Little Women or Where the Red Fern Grows. Kid/YA fiction is lovely.
I’ll have to say Paris; every time I read about my favorite authors there is mention of their time in that city and how she helped them evolve into the writer they were meant to be….
“Of course, this should only worry readers who care about art.”
I can’t tell if this is derogatory or just a statement. When you say “art” do you mean the visual art that accompanies a given book, or are you saying that readers who aren’t afraid of giving up typography and all that just don’t care about art?
In any case, this point was the only one that really holds any weight with me, but still not much. There are certainly books such as House of Leaves that would lose all their power and effectiveness on an e-reader. However, I can’t say I imagine losing too much reading Animal Farm, Infinite Jest, or even The Great Gatsby digitally. Those books would be all about the content to me. Not to mention most books go through so many revisions and reprints by new publishers and new editions that any original typographical, layout, or cover design choices may have accompanied the author’s original work get completely lost over time.
I don’t know, I’m an eighteen year-old who absolutely loves reading, so I’m already an anomaly, but I can’t bring myself to get up in arms about e-readers being the death of reading (not that I think this article is saying that). I have enough faith that books that should be printed in physical form will continue to be printed in physical form. As for the rest, well, they’ll all be on my Kindle, whether I get around to reading them before 500 years is up or not.
Hope this wasn’t too negative. This was a well thought out and written article, I just don’t agree with it. (Civil discussion on the internet?)
I really don’t think there’s any other contender than Berkley in America. There’s a book shop on every block. Literally. Powell’s alone would be enough to earn it the title.
The 30% of Americans who do read 15+ books a year is nothing to sneeze at. Konrath sells 30,000 books a month by pricing at 2.99. If more books are priced at 2.99 on Amazon, more people will read more books. Few people read 3000 books in their lifetime, but many will buy 3,000 books in their life.
3. Please. The average reader doesn’t give a damn about typography or how pretty the book looks on paper. All it does is inflate the cost of the book, cheaper book costs, means cheaper books, means more buyers.
I run a book club – it’s relatively new, we only have a couple of meetings under our belt – and there are only two of us who use an e-Reader so far. One person I mentioned the group to asked if we could use an eReader (I don’t know why she thought I would care).
I imagine we may see more adoption. It’s awfully convenient that in addition to reading on my eReader, I’m able to pick up where I left off on my phone with one hand, and use the other for a handhold while I’m commuting.
I loved SMILE so much I was reluctant to part with it and give it to my niece. (I bought it for her but had to read it first to make sure it was okay.)
@ Jane: I want to read more of the Scudder and Rhodenbarr books. I’ve only sampled a couple from each series. But that’s the great thing about Crime Fiction there’s always more.
That said, John Dortmunder will most likely always be my man for Comic Crime Books. Poor poor man.
Correction: I love love love the Hit Man books. I have recommended them to all my friends who read and many who don’t but certainly oughta! I was the died in the WOOL Matthew Scudder fan until I found Bernie Rhodenbarr and then wham! I found Hit Man. Now I am reading A Touch of the Hard Stuff. LB is a fine wine and just keeps on getting better with age.
I love love love the Hit Man books. I have recommended them to all my friends who read and many who don’t but certainly oughta! I was the died in the wall Matthew Scudder fan until I found Bernie Rhodenbarr and then wham! I found Hit Man. Now I am reading A Touch of the Hard Stuff. LB is a fine wine and just keeps on getting better with age.
My favorite author is Thomas, McGuane. His writing is simple, clear and a reflection of a glass of water half
full. This author gave me the courage to write, and keep it simple, but with my own style of poetic nuance. I have become a brave Writer, not afraid to fail on the desolate plains of getting my novels published.
Lestat de Lioncourt from the Anne Rice Vampire Chronicles
Ooh now THERE is real vampire. Sexy and sensual, utterly evil, yet able to fall in love with music,and art. He makes you want to just offer your neck and join him in eternity.
I can identify with this. I remember scoffing at e-readers because I love actual books. However I have a small apartment with space for only one shelf (sniff) and can only keep my faves. I also ended up happily buying a book only to discover by the 4th chapter that I’d read some time in the past. I finally caved and bought a Kindle 3. So now I’m a happy, not ecstatic Kindle owner and can read to my heart’s content without worrying about clutter or a double purchase. If I love a book enough I get it in print. I think that’s a good arrangement.
Great piece! I always enjoy Jon’s articles. This is so informative for all writers, established and aspiring.
I especially like the last point, about bringing networking back into real time, because I think that’s so important. And it leads me to the question I wanted to pose, as a devil’s advocate. What if you’re a writer and you really don’t want to tweet, and blog, and use Facebook to engage with your readers? Can an emerging writer refuse to do these things and still get picked up by a publisher and build an audience? Or is the way to go to find a recently graduated English major to ghostwrite your blog and twitter feed?
I’m not a big fan of e-readers. There is nothing that can replace the feel of an actual book in my hands. I try to limit my e-reading to books that I know that I’m not going to want to or have to flip back and forth in. That’s too hard to do with an e-reader.
I read and write YA so fortunately my crushes don’t transfer to real life as I am over 18. That said. . . my current lit crush is Etienne St. Clair from Anna and the French Kiss but I will always have spots in my heart for Mr. Darcy and Rochester. I know cliche’.
My friend has the best, she read a biography on Abraham Lincoln and now refers to him as “Baberham”.
If I recall the Krakauer situation correctly, though, I think the take on it here is misleading. I thought Krakauer was actually collaborating with 60 Minutes on the story. Is that wrong?
(And if that’s the case, he wasn’t just able to race to get it out quickly after the show, he and 60 Minutes timed them for near-simultaneous release.)
This sounds like something I would enjoy immensely, yet I’ve somehow never heard of it. This is going right to the top of my “to read” list. Great article/feature idea.
I have to admit that I fell pretty hard for Kim Pine in Bryan Lee O’Malley’s Scott Pilgrim books (I have a thing for sardonic freckled red heads).
My real crush would have to be on the not entirely fictional Sara Vowell though. Also in the crushes on girl’s much smarter and more talented than I, I have to admit she may have been recently supplanted by Kate Beaton.
This is really interesting. I’ve never really consulted an author’s bestseller list-status before choosing what to read before, and I don’t plan on starting now. I like finding those “diamond in the rough” novels…it’s very satisfying!
As a writer, I never really considered doing an ebook before I learned of your choice to do so. Now I think it’s a great idea! I’m reading your book now and I can really see the “heart and soul” you mentioned. Great job!
This is the first that I am hearing of Thomas Harriot, bet he sounds like a fascinating historical figure. I am curious to see what the historical record will reflect about him since this is a fictional portrayal.
I totally see the crush on Stuart from “the Help.” I’m curious who’s playing him in the movie. He’s really kind of a sleazy character because he’s so hot and cold towards Skeeter and Skeeter is such a likable character, but there were times that he was sweet and the reader could totally get a little crush on him.
I’m not sure whether this is off-topic, given that I’m referencing “Harry Potter” the movie here, instead of the books, but I love Harry Potter as a character whether he’s on the page or on the screen.
So yesterday my friends and I went over to my parents’ house to use their pool and in the evening we were sunburnt and hanging out in their living room and my mom shouts, “Liz, turn on the TV to ABC Family real quick!” So I turn it on and it’s the scene in “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire” where Harry is finishing the second round in the competition where they have to save their friends from the bottom of the lake at Hogwarts and Harry flies out of the water and he lands, breathless, on the dock in his swimsuit.
My mom knows that I like that part, because it’s the movie where Harry has finally grown leg hair and you get to see his bare legs. I was 17 when that movie first came out (6 years ago) and I remember catcalling the screen in the movie theater and people laughing, but I like to lay claims to the fact that I thought HP was hot before anyone else did. And I remember being attracted to Harry when I was 11, before the movies came out or the books were even phenomenally popular.
Becca-Reading a (paper) book is a very tactile experience and e-readers can’t replicate that. And I too have found some gems in the Borders clearance section.
Janet-I didn’t realized they were so flexible with seniors. That makes it even more of a loss.
What’s tragic is that Border’s was a well-known employer of seniors, often letting them work part time (with benefits) in NY and then in FLA where they spent the winters.
The biggest loss to me is the ability to browse. To read the back and the first page to see how a book feels. To find new authors in the clearance or bogo section and spend months reading their other works. This just doesn’t happen online, I’ve tried. I guess I’ll do my browsing at B&N and my buying on Amazon now.
I’ve never read the books or seen any of the movies but it got kids reading again, interested in books. Although I can’t appreciate ebook readers like Kindle or Nook, it sparked an interest in creative expression and acceptance that there can only be more of.
I like Dystopian novels. Societies gone wrong and the only ones who can fight are the young because they still have hope. I’m a sucker for this plot, it gets me every time.
But I’m tired of the love triangle. Yes this book has one. I’m not sure why this is but, apparently, in the future all boys love the same girl. You know that girl who’s too tough to show emotion but always manages to fall hopelessly in love with two boys (of course one’s blond and the other brunette).
I’m going to go out on a limb here and say if people today are having difficulty getting together than I’m not so sure oppressed future societies would have a bunch love triangles. It’s not the Love Boat they’re on, these kids are fighting for their lives.
Eek! I haven’t read this book, but at first glance, I have to disagree– this description sounds like this book cheapens the 1920s. My perception of the 20s, with all its excess and drinking and sex (and womanizing) and jazz is that it was still a literary and very creative time, and I hate to see it GossipGirl-ified, as in, there’s money but it’s cheap. Actually, it sounds more like Pretty Little Liars, which is worse.
I’ll have to read it to have an educated opinion, but I’d much rather see historical YA fiction that doesn’t dumb things down with scandal–I think it would take a more creative author to make YA fiction that speaks for itself, with more substance and less scandal.
Well, she’s not exactly a CHILDREN’s author, but she’s a young adult author.
JUDY BLUME.
My first favorite chapter book was “Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing.” And then “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” Judy helped shape my love for reading and writing. Today, I’m a former newspaper reporter, professional writer of several forms (corporate, creative, script, and editorial). Thanks Judy Blume!
As an author, I hate amazon reviews. Sometimes it feels like amazon is juicycampus for authors, where people can come and rant and write often cruel reviews–anonymously, of course. And there seems to be some kind of trend that when a book has upwards of 200 amazon reviews, their average star-rating goes down, usually around 3 stars, because presumably when a book gets popular, the naysayers feel more inclined to rip it online (still anonymously). Not a fan.
I think I pay the most attention to author blurbs, like Oh, Curtis Sittenfeld blurbed this! Or, Oh, Augusten Burroughs blurbed this. This isn’t a fool-proof system for finding good books (I recently read an Augusten Burroughs-blurbed book that wasn’t good at all), but I consider the opinions of published authors much more heavily than I consider the opinions of anonymous amazon reviewers (who could be bitter Brown University juniors or bored assistants in LA).
I do a mix of all of the above. I do like when I get suggestions from other readers but I’ve also been known to browse for a couple hours in a book store to pick up something that catches my eye. As a book blogger, I think that reviews from my peers are helpful, especially once I find someone that has similar reading tastes to me. I’ve also found a lot of books that I wouldn’t normally pick up through other book bloggers. Admittedly, I don’t typically read Amazon reviews. When I go to Amazon, I usually already know the book that I’m looking for!
Thanks Sara. I thought about including a photo of myself face down at a bar as another helpful aid, but then thought that might be too much info. Glad you liked it.
I want a typewriter so badly! Whenever I see one in a consignment shop, I’m always so tempted to buy it… I’m not sure that I’d use it–it would be purely decorative.
This is so interesting! I did some googling and found lots of great press for the Poetry Brothel, but I also found some feminist blogs that really took issue with the Poetry Brothel’s presumed romanticism of prostitution in turn of the century New York (because late 1800s/early 1900s-era sex workers probably turned tricks out of financial desperation, or worse yet, without a say in the matter at all). I can see the detractors’ point, but I think what the Poetry Brothel is doing is so important, breathing life into poetry and making poetry relevant–and sexy!–for a younger audience.
I’m wondering what it’s like when you have a pet project and people really come after what you’re doing with claws bared. I’d be so curious to hear how Lisa and the other poets reacted and coped.
I got really into reading plays when I lived in New York. The formatting can be hard to read–you have to get used to the fact that it’s not like reading a book and you need to retrain your brain a bit–but it’s totally worth it. I really like the “Spring Awakening” play and “Equus” is one of my favorites (got into “Equus” after seeing Daniel Radcliffe in the show on Broadway in 2008).
As a writer, I completely agree. I have no problem writing non-fiction and journalism, but when I try fiction, I feel self-conscious and extremely critical of my writing… not to mention paranoid about what other people will say about it and think about it. I don’t think Keli Goff is being hyperbolic at all–I commend her for being so honest!
http://www.thecopia.com sent me an email. They are giving away ebook copies of Alexander Dumas The Borgias, which was apparently source material for the Showtime series. this piqued my interest. Who knew that M. Dumas was the Gawker/TMZ of his time, devoting his his time to a series called Celebrated Crimes? Apparently, he was a devoted gossip — spewing hearsay and innuendo. I look forward to reading my free copy.
Nayana Currimbhoy posted on
July 6, 2011
Love it love it love it! Your review pulls out all my little secret references, delighted that you picked so many, and you kept my favorite for the end – I had most fun with Atlas Shrugged inside History of British Rule in India! I changed the name of that novel so many times! Thank you so much Jada, you made my day!
50 FIRST DATES meets MEMENTO in book form. Gripping at first, I had this one figured out before I was half into it. Perfect beach book, as frequent naps and not paying attention fit well within the theme and style of the book.
This guy I know has a really amazing tattoo of Shackleton. Might try and get to this one after Two Years Before the Mast. (Only one seafaring adventure at a time.)
I think that publishers still have the ability to reach out to more people than indie publishers or self-publishers. One has to be a little more willing to look for the books published by indie publishers or the self-published. You’re going to be hard pressed to find those kinds of books at a big box store or your local Barnes and Noble.
As a book blogger, I think that those within the book blogging community have the ability to become a sort of PR for the indies and the self-published but the fact of the matter is that most of the people who look to blogs for book recommendations are other book bloggers. It’s not a bad thing but our audiences are still pretty limited compared to those of the big name publishers.
Personally book blogs have become an invaluable resource in finding new books and debut authors. I don’t need a gatekeeper when I have the internet and opinionated readers.
There is one thing I do miss about traditionally published books and that is editing. Even if a book is self-published the author should spend some money or time getting their book copy edited at least (and this is coming from someone who can’t spell or diagram a sentence).
Jazz … Booze … Boys … It’s a dangerous combination.
What girl doesn’t want to be a flapper? This book captures the 20′s (or what I picture the 20′s to be) with
just enough clothes, slang and history to make this time period come to life.
At first I wasn’t wild about the premise, catty girls in the 20′s but my love affair with times gone by made me pick it up and I’m glad I did. It’s essentially a soap opera with Gloria falling for a taboo love, Clara’s dark secrets and Loraine bad choices but the back drop of 1920′s Chicago makes this book come to life.
I’ve known Jennifer for over 30 years, since back in the days of “those Hollywood nights”. Blessed and thrilled to see this book about her life thus far I can’t recommend it enough to anyone, ‘believer’ or not.
I read a really interesting LA Times blog post on this book basically saying how just being famous in the way that Ms. Palin is famous (1. For her mother being famous and 2. becoming the poster child for teen moms) doesn’t really warrant writing a memoir. I’ve gotta agree.
I’m still itchin’ and scratchin’ after reading this creepy horror novel set in a New York brownstone…possibly located near Guy and Rosemary Woodhouse’s place. Strange things certainly happen in those old New York apartments. Oof! I started the novel this morning as I waited in my foot doctor’s office, continued reading it when I stopped for lunch, read it while I waited for a friend at the movie theatre and finished it tonight. Ben Winters sets quite the mood and certainly gave me my share of shivers. What’s that red welt on your cheek? Could it be….a bedbug bite? Agggghhhhh!
So many points to touch on. I teach in a grade school and Dan is absolutely right. This is filtering down to 4th and 5th graders who are using “gay” as a slur and trying to spread rumors about those boys and girls who just don’t fit in, for whatever reason. I honestly don’t remember thinking about any of this at all in grade school. But there is progress. My two best friends in high school, one boy and one girl dated each other to keep their classmates from knowing they were gay. Even still, the girl was bullied and called a “lesbo” because she was an athlete (this was early 70s), and it was so hurtful and cruel. No one would have dared to use the “N-word” or call any of my friends “kikes,” but this was acceptable. Today, my daughter has at least 4 girlfriends who have come out and are proud lesbians. At her high school, the prom king and queen her junior year were a gay and lesbian. That’s here, in Chicagoland. Even our Bishop Hanson of the ELCA participated in your project. My nephew in Germany wasn’t fairing so well and had to switch schools. He stopped going to church because he says they hate him there and condemn him to hell. You’re right best of times, worst of times, depending on where you are and who supports you. You may not think of yourselves as heroes, but keep up the good work anyway.
To my mind a “digital autograph” is no autograph at all. It’s a facsimile. That people would even consider it a real thing brings to mind all sorts of disturbing ideas about what people accept as “reality” today.
IRON HOUSE was an entertaining summer read with well developed charcters and a quick pace. But the graphic violence was a bit much for me to handle. Gritty and dark, this thriller isn’t for everyone. Don’t read it while you’re eating.
Skivs! I wanted to love it but didn’t. Maybe my expectations were too high.
There are so many good things going on in this book: the premise, the characters and the world Julia Karr creates are all excellent. However she got a little preachy. Her message about the power of media, sexteens and porn was so heavy handed I caught myself rolling my eyes. At one point I thought I was back in film school and waiting to hear “Don’t objectify me with your male gaze.”
I liked Sal. I thought the tension between him and Nina could have been built up more. It was a little too easy for them but I liked his revolutionary ways.
I’m on the fence about recommending this book. If you like dystopian YA then it’s worth the read.
They cure cancer but unleash a virus that kills girls at 20 and boys at 25. I’m in.
Rhine is kidnapped and forced into a polygamist marriage. I’m in.
There’s a hot servant that she’s crushing on. I’m in.
But this is where she lost me.
*SPOILER ALERT*
– Sure she’s kidnapped but treated really well.
– Linden, her husband is really nice and respectful. He’s also a lot naive.
– She’s nutty for Gabriele who’s she’s had like 6 conversations with.
– Her life before all this wasn’t so great.
– You only have 3.5 years left, stay with the rich dude. Her rat invested basement just doesn’t seem that great.
I admit I read this quickly and enjoyed it but there were some major story flaws.
Not bad for a debut, I’ll tell you that. There were some places that were a bit cliche (getting revenge on the mean kids), but most of it was quite original (combining the idea of using the Furies as a method to punish those who do bad/immoral/questionable things), and really enjoyable. This one’s definitely going on my bookshelf at some point, just for that aspect alone.
Okay, so left, right, and center we now have paranormal books using the Greek canon in modern day formats. There’s “Starcrossed”, “Darkness Becomes Her”, and now “Fury” – all very good, all using the Greek mythos in different aspects to tell their tales. I could get used to this trend of use if it keeps producing such good results.
I think my biggest problem was indeed with the idea of the mean/popular/rich kids getting punished (not a bad thing, but it’s been done to death within YA canon), but what Miles did with that overused trope really turned everything around (aside from having a Big Reveal I wasn’t exactly expecting near the end of the book). There’s the admission by Drea, one of the unpopular kids, knowledgable on the Furies, that the Furies themselves don’t really get the difference within the spectrum of “bad/hurtful” things that people do – they only see bad and good, right and wrong, black and white – not how things in life really are. And the way Miles does this is absolutely awesome, which is what not only saves the story but boosts it to my “best of 2011″ list.
For example, we have Emily, Gabby, and Zach – that entire love triangle that was waiting to happen, which Zach more or less instigated by himself. While Emily is definitely not innocent (and she owns up to this only after one or two sessions of denial – definitely progress in YA relationship lit), Drea admits that what happened to Chase for doing bad things and what’s going to happen to Emily if things keep going unchecked are different on the moral scale. Chase pretty much ruined a girl’s entire life, not just breaking her heart, but breaking all of her. Emily was semi-coerced into an illicit relationship with her best friend’s boyfriend, though she understood it was wrong and did break it off. Because she did, she was rewarded, while still being punished for hurting her friend. But her reward for repentance came with a huge cost, though we don’t know what that is (to be revealed in the rest of the series). The fact that Miles really hammers home that everything comes with a cost, including forgiveness, is important. A lot of YA lit doesn’t do this, or they overdo it and make it the Moral of the Story. Here, I think the Moral of the Story is the fact that the world is not Good or Bad, but it’s a gradation of good, bad, and what’s in between. Just like there is no moral black or white, but a series of grays. It’s all about how and where we choose to fall in that gradation with our choices and actions. Using the Furies and their blindness (not just physical blindness too, as how they’ve been described throughout history) is a great way to further the ultimate message to the reader.
So I really commend Miles on an awesome story. I seriously cannot wait to read the rest of the series, and look forward to more Furies awesomeness to come. I have so many questions that are currently unanswered (what triggers the Furies coming to town, even though we know they’re always hanging around somewhere in time and space, is a good example). I can’t wait to find out what this price is that Emily paid (aside from the fact that she is now doomed to unrequited love with her other best friend), if it’s more than what was already stated (and I think it is).
Miles, be proud. You saved an overused teenage trope and turned into pure awesomeness. Wear my “Best of 2011″ badge with pride!
(posted to inreads, goodreads, librarything, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
Wow. That’s pretty much all I can say after two days of processing an amazing ending that was NINE BOOKS in the making. If “Naamah’s Blessing” doesn’t propel the “Kushiel’s Legacy” series into epic fantasy, I don’t know what will, or even what epic fantasy even is anymore.
It really amazes me how Carey managed to tie up pretty much everything from the first book in the “Kushiel” series (“Kushiel’s Dart”) up until this last book in the series, number nine. Any loose ends that readers might have picked up at the end of each trilogy was brilliantly tied together by the end of “Naamah’s Blessing”. Seriously. Guys, this is talent. Any doubts I might have had about Carey as a writer are more or less absolutely gone now.
All I can hope, though, is that this isn’t the last we’ve heard of the “Kushiel’s Legacy” world. It seems that per trilogy time in that world progressed somewhere from 100-300 years from the last book of one trilogy to the first of a next. That’s just an estimate for me, but it felt about right. I think we started somewhere in what might be the mid-to-late 15th century in Kushiel’s Dart and ended in the 18th Century (or possibly the early 19th century). But the mirrors that Carey built from her world to ours (or perhaps the reverse) were striking in detail with nothing left to the imagination in terms of a firm and solid setting.
And it was good to see all of the old characters coming back in some way or another by the end of this book. It was good to see Moirin reflecting on not only her own journey, but the journey of humanity within the “Kushiel” world, and where it might be going. How in the end, we’re all connected, regardless of color, creed, etc. It seems too grandiose when I say it now, but if you read it, you’ll surely feel it on the same epic scale I did. This is the final message of the “Kushiel” series, should it choose to end here. And I really hope it doesn’t. Not by a long shot. I’d love to see what might turn out to be America in that other world, and the other countries, the wars, and everything that comes with them. I want to see the evolution of the people of Terre d’Ange to what they might be like today. If that makes sense.
If this is the end, then it’s a good ending. If not, it’s a fantastic place for a new story to begin. I can only hope it’s the former, though, because I’m addicted to the “Kushiel” world. Definitely one of my picks under the romantic fantasy catagory for 2011.
(posted to librarything, goodreads, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
Picking up right where we left off at the end of “The Dead-Tossed Waves”, “The Dark and Hollow Places” ups the pace of the story, making us feel just as desperate as the rest of the main characters thus far.
This last third book in the trilogy (though I really, really hope there are others!) unites all of the characters we’ve met since the first book together in a frenetic union of panic and love, lust and hurt. Annah’s love of her sister combined with the hate that springs forth once she learns how Abagail/Gabry grew up is a tasty treat, sweet and sour, to be enjoyed slowly as it simmers to a head near the middle of the book. Just as the first book was Mary’s story and the second was Gabry’s, make no mistake that this last story in the trilogy belongs to Annah and Ryan never lets us forget that. We’re deeply immersed in Annah and her psyche the entire time, and how she fights with herself on whether she loves or hates her sister, Catcher, and Elias.
Between this and the panic spurred on by the actions of Catcher, Elias, and Gabry at the end of the previous book, it feels like you’re on a marathon – heart pounding, lactic acid in your legs the entire time. And it burns – teenage love in the middle of a world that’s ending.
But it burns so, so good. Ryan has only honed and perfected her craft of agonized teenage affection throughout all three books, which is really well represented in this last story.
And then there’s the generational aspect as well; Mary’s story was the first story, somewhere around 20 years previous to the second book. By the end of this third book, you get the feeling that things have come full circle, that there is hope, another generation to be born, and even though they may have to fight for their lives, they WILL live.
That, ultimately, I think is Ryan’s message: if there’s life there’s hope, and if there’s hope, there’s love. And that’s what makes us different from the dead, just as Annah says in the book – the fact that we’re aware and fight for these emotions makes us alive, makes us fallible, but makes us human. This is the line that separates us from the dead.
I really hope there are more books in the world of “Hands and Teeth” – “Hare Moon”, a novella just released online (which I haven’t had a chance to read yet), apparently also takes place in the same universe. But I’d like a prequel, maybe something to answer what happened to cause the Return, or a sequel/separate trilogy of what happened after this last book. I won’t take no for an answer.
This one’s in my top five for 2011 so far, and the year’s not even over yet. Simply gorgeous.
(crossposted to librarything, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
Guys. GUYS. Two words for you: Vampire. Thief. That’s all you need to know going into reading this series. It’s so very, very awesome and it blew me away. I think I actually like this series more than Priest’s “Clockwork Century” series and I’ve only read the first book so far. Needless to say, I’m practically foaming at the mouth for the next book now.
I loved everything about this book. Priest executed all of the pieces of her plot more or less perfectly. Raylene is a sympathetic, hilarious character that has neurotic pitfalls – making her more human than vampire most of the time (especially with her magical bag of tricks that she carries everywhere with her). I mean, come on. Neurotic vampires? In 99% of urban fantasy (and YA paranormal, though this isn’t YA, obviously), vampires are cocky, gorgeous, and utterly sure of themselves with excellent self-esteem. Raylene is pretty and cocky, but not the rest. Her cockiness comes from years and years of experience within the game of thievery and fencing, not out of just being undead. I like that Priest made her that way, because I felt like I could connect to her all the more easily. I’m pretty neurotic myself, so it was nice to see a paranormal creature have some mental issues herself.
And then there’s the main plot – government experiments. I love plots with government experiments. And this one just made me hunger for more information, as this book kind of left us on a cliffhanger. Yes, there were some of the questions answered at the end, but the larger ones (how did the government find out that there were vampires, or werewolves, at all, for instance?) were left open. As we’re getting a second book soon (and I seriously cannot wait to get my hot little hands on it), I’m hoping we’ll get more of these larger answers soon. It looks like the entire cast will be back for book two, which makes me all the more excited.
This, of course, means more ass-kicking ex-Navy SEAL drag queens, of course. Priest, I love you. Seriously. Have my literary babies, won’t you? Thieving vamps, government experiments, and drag queens. What a book.
If you’re tired of the “chicks in leather pants” stereotype/truth of the urban fantasy genre, try out “Bloodshot” and get some much needed fresh air into you. You definitely will NOT regret it. Definitely one of my picks for the best of 2011 in the urban fantasy genre.
(crossposted to librarything, goodreads, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
This was actually a recommendation from fellow 2011 debut author and all around awesome friend Josephine Angelini — when I met her for our interview, she couldn’t stop raving about this book! So naturally, my curiosity was quite peaked. That and Josie has good taste in books anyway, so..yeah. This, ladies and gentlemen, is yet another example of awesome YA romance done right. It’s balanced with humor and its supernatural plot elements so I didn’t feel suffocated by it. Definitely one of my picks for 2011 so far (along with “Starcrossed”).
Plum definitely has a way with words — so much so that I felt as if I really were in Paris. I’ve never been to Paris, either, so that is really saying something. She has created an entirely new supernatural canon of creatures within the age-old construct of good versus evil, dead versus undead. I really loved the way she played with all of these different concepts but on a level so subtle I didn’t really realize all of this put together until near the end of the (way too short!) book.
Vincent seemed like a realistic guy — yeah, he’s pretty, but he’s also smart. He’s protective, but he also lets his girl have her independence. This is very refreshing within the realm of YA romance lit, and I can only count a few more titles that have this quality to their romances. It’s nice to see the girl saving the day instead of being the damsel in distress — better, it’s having her be both the hero and the damsel while saving another damsel (Vincent, in this case). It’s the unison of the male and the female within one body, the neuter gender quality once she’s let Vincent-as-Volant enter her to help fight the Numa. It takes balls to write a fiesty female lead like this one, much less a romance with her in it.
I found no flaws with this book — it had me from the first page. The debut class of 2011 has quite a few authors that have written stories that have kept my attention and deserved my praise. “Die for Me” is one of them, and I hope this isn’t the last we hear from Plum.
Want a non-traditional ghost story, or romance? Pick this book up and see how romance can be done without being shoved down your throat.
(crossposted to librarything, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
If I ever have children, you can be sure that this is going to be the very first book I have in my bedtime story library. Never have I laughed so hard, and never have I wished more that this book existed when I babysat other kids as a teenager. Yes, it was that awesome. Especially I went and got the audiobook version – Samuel L. Jackson as the narrator? GENIUS. Pure genius.
Okay, seriously. I think we’ve all had to go and babysit for someone at some point in our lives; for family members, for summer jobs, etc., and our charges weren’t very good about going to sleep at night. Right now, this is my little niece – she almost never sleeps. I got this book in audiobook format for my uncle and cousin so they can release some stress (safely) while trying to get her to go to sleep at the same time for Father’s Day this year.
This book is all about that absolutely desperate feeling you get when you just want the child to be unconscious so you can have a little you time, or date time with your significant other, or something similar. You love the child, sure, or you’re fond of them enough to be there reading them a bedtime story (even if it’s a babysitting job). You NEED them to be unconscious for the sake of your sanity.
Some might call this book crude and irreverent, but honestly, it’s nothing like that. At least, that’s how I think of it. This was written by a parent for his children, illustrated by a parent for his children, so it’s not like they’re doing it out of anger at their children. This is for the parents/caretakers more than the children to be sure, but it’s still sweet in that it goes over every single excuse in the book children at bedtime will use to try to get out of it.
The bonus interview with Jackson at the beginning of the audiobook version is helpful, too, because he too relates as an exasperated parent/caretaker with his kids and trying to get them to go to sleep. All of this is done out of love. Desperate, awful love, but love all the same. And you can tell.
So have a good time with this book. It’s obviously not to be taken seriously as a children’s book, otherwise it’d probably be censored by the government or something. Release a little stress and laugh. But not too loud, or your child might wake up, and then you just might have to read them this book after all in desperation to save your nerves.
One of the best of 2011 for the children’s book/humor categories. Loved it, and I can’t wait to own the hardcover! This will definitely go down as one of the classics (like “Where the Wild Things Are”) as subversive bedtime lit. Mark my words.
(crossposted to librarything, goodreads, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
I tried to finish this one, I really did. I just found that I couldn’t. The original plot was interesting enough, but that quickly declined after a few chapters and it descended into mediocrity.
I think the author was aiming for high or epic fantasy with writing this book, but it just didn’t hit the mark. As Alera’s story continues with her getting harrassed by her suitors right and left, I found it harder and harder to emotionally click with her. What happened to the awesome blood-soaked mystery that I read at the start of the book? All of this seemed to fly out the window and with it, all sense of continuity by the time I reached the third chapter.
Writing something that could be considered both YA and high fantasy is hard – I will definitely give Kluver that much. However, you don’t have to stuff romance into something to make it palatable to the YA audience. The (attempted, since neither guy seemed to click with her) romance here felt very forced, whereas in Cinda Williams Chima’s “Seven Realms” series, the romance there is far more gentle and more natural, coming very slowly but that’s what felt right about it. Here, had there been attempted no romance, I think the novel would have worked far better and would have landed itself into the “pretty good” realm of YA high fantasy.
Furthermore, I feel like Kluver didn’t really put enough into her attempted romance even though she did try to force it with the characters. She could have built chemistry if she’d been really determined to have a love triangle, but she didn’t. That’s another thing that really disappointed me about this book – Kluver seems like she’s a really promising writer, but everything fell short of the mark in almost every category. Alera didn’t feel real, I couldn’t connect to her, and not all YA books need a love triangle. In the end, that’s what did it for me.
This isn’t to say that I’m not averse to reading anything new of Kluver’s – bring it on! I would like to see more from her, and I hope that her next book is far better than this one.
(originally posted at witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com, crossposted to goodreads and shelfari)
I have to say, Angelini definitely took a risk with her story when you consider the amount of YA fiction that’s currently paranormal/past life/myth-based that’s hit the shelves within the last few years. But you know what? Unlike so many of the hyped titles out there, girl made it WORK.
Just as the title suggests, there is a theme of starcrossed lovers from the past in the background of this tale, but it’s not so utterly overwhelming (say it together, kids! “twilight syndrome”) that it smothers the base arc and ideas of the plot itself.
If there’s going to be romance in my story, that’s the kind of romance I like. Let it sit in the background and let it grow until it finally comes to the forefront on its own, with its own momentum, and not pushed or forced like so many of the same sub-genre type of YA books. And thankfully, luckily, Angelini does it with grace and style with ancient Greece meeting Romeo and Juliet (without the suiciding, of course – but I tend to think of this story more in terms of the 1996 film version) in a tolerable and fun way. And of course, the bloody weeping furies don’t hurt, either.
The idea of familial houses feuding mixed with Greek myths is something I hadn’t really considered before, and when I read the inital blurb when it hit goodreads I was more than a little wary about how the content would flow despite the fact that the these two themes work perfectly together when one considers all of the ancient Greek literary canon. It’s difficult to make the two place nicely together in a modern setting, but this time, from page one I was captured by Angelini’s characters and the world she built around them. Or is it the other way around – the world that built itself around her characters?
What was also refreshing was the abundance of male restraint shown by Lucas around Helen after they stopped trying to kill each other – not out of wariness in terms of paranoia (“oh god she’s going to kill me”), but in terms of not only respect, but keeping himself in check with sexual advances (“oh god the world’s going to go to hell if I give in, no seriously it will”). Can I just say that it’s really refreshing to have a sexually-positive atmosphere with these characters, all acknowledging what they want, who they want, and being frank about it? The “twilight syndrome” that’s been going around (seriously, CDC, get on top of it) has this kind of subversive sexuality that’s not even fun, but rather repressive and self-destructive to all characters involved. (I could go and make a “Bella was a sexual predator” argument here, but I’m not even going to touch that right now.) You have two characters falling for each other and very aware of their hormones, but they’re also aware of the consequences of what will happen should they give in to their baser instincts. Very rarely with paranormal YA fiction do you have the clear and explicit outlining of what will happen should characters get involved sexually. I’m not speaking of things in a physical sense (you get pregnant, etc), but more in a broader, larger, existential worldview – what will happen to the world around you, the people you love aside from your partner, etc. Aside from the “Hex Hall” series (so far) and “XVI”, that hasn’t really been bluntly addressed in mainstream YA paranormal fiction as of yet. At least, that’s how it feels to me.
It could be that I’m overanalyzing things on this one, but that’s par for the course for me. Insert a Kanye shrug here.
The way that violence, sex, myths, and life is addressed is wonderfully explicit and rare. This makes me one happy reader.
For all of these reasons (and many more), I’d say “Starcrossed” is definitely one of the best of 2011 so far in the catagory of new series. If the teasers I provided last week for Teaser Tuesday weren’t enough, just sneak into your local bookstore once it’s on the shelves and read parts of it for yourself. You won’t be sorry.
(crossposted to librarything and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
But when I saw this at the library, I figured I may as well give it a whirl. I’ve enjoyed the literary mashups (“Pride, Prejudice, and Zombies”, anyone?) that have been so popular as of late – they make Austen tolerable for me. I hoped that “Jane” would bring that same pleasure. And thankfully, that hope wasn’t in vain.
I had my reservations about reading another Austen remake, because the original hadn’t really stuck well with me over the years. It puzzles me why girls fall all over themselves over characters like Mr. Darcy (though he wasn’t in this book) – give me Dickens over Austen any day. His social justice-centered stories seem much deeper than that of Austen’s superficial ones (well, in my opinion, they’ve always had a more superficial feel to them).
So you can see why I had my reservations about picking up a more faithful, less zombie-filled version of an Austen remake.
Lindner has skills. I will give her that – she has made me actually love this book far more than the original, to the point where I’m wanting to reread the original to compare where she made changes. I got attached to Jane Moore and Nico Rathburn and the entire drama between them, which is rare for me. To say that I loved this book is a very rare thing as I usually run screaming for the hills when I encounter anything even resembling this sort of story.
So, instead of the endless “Jane Eyre” remakes, can we have a movie or a miniseries for this book? I know I’d watch it.
All of my issues with female-centric lit aside, this book is very much worth reading for anyone, Austen fans and the not alike. It dragged me kicking and screaming into Lindner’s world, and I had fun with it each minute. Wonderful remake.
Quirk Classics? The ball is now in your court. Wow me.
(crossposted to librarything, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
I was born in the 80s, I grew up in the 90s, when the media market image of girls became the most sexualized it’s ever been. Flashbacks of CNN debates about the oversexing of the “desired” female image in the west came to mind when I started reading this book – not that that’s a a bad thing. This book paints a picture of what our future may be if we keep going the way we’re going.
I have to say – for a debut, I was floored by the sheer balls that Karr has for even bringing up this i…moreI was born in the 80s, I grew up in the 90s, when the media market image of girls became the most sexualized it’s ever been. Flashbacks of CNN debates about the oversexing of the “desired” female image in the west came to mind when I started reading this book – not that that’s a a bad thing. This book paints a picture of what our future may be if we keep going the way we’re going.
I have to say – for a debut, I was floored by the sheer balls that Karr has for even bringing up this issue, much less couching it in a future that seems all too plausible as clothing sizes get smaller, more and more skin is bared on primetime television, and kids start having sex at younger and younger ages (not to mention starting puberty at record early ages as well).
I like to think of myself as a sex-positive girl. I believe that as long as everyone has informed consent with their sex, I have no right to intervene or complain. The keywords here are “informed consent” – not just consent, which can be taken advantage of by sex predators in terms of ignorance on the part of the victim, but informed consent – knowing your risks, knowing where you’re safe and where you’re not. This book really hit home with me as I’ve never really felt comfortable about expressing my sexuality (well, that and I have severe intimacy issues, but we won’t get into that now) and the idea of being fair game as soon as you turn sixteen, whether you like it or not, scared the hell out of me.
Which, I think, was one of the points of the book – rethink the current policies and images as projected to us by modern culture in order to keep ourselves safe.
I believe that this book should probably be made mandatory reading by parents to their daughters before they get taken advantage of. Knowledge is power, and we as girls need all the power we can get in order to protect ourselves.
Thank you, Ms. Karr, for writing this book, for urging us not to be complacent and to remind us of the dangers out there that if we leave unchecked, could very well be our future.
(crossposted to goodreads, inreads, librarything, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
This is a gorgeous, wonderful book. I just have to say that right up front. It has all that I look for in this genre (alternate history/steampunk) – mad scientists, detectives, general paranormal activity, feisty females, and a little (but not too much) romance. Oh, and did I mention it also features a primitive version of Skynet?
When you throw all of the above mentioned features together and put it into an accessible YA package, you have my heart for life. This is a great adventure…moreThis is a gorgeous, wonderful book. I just have to say that right up front. It has all that I look for in this genre (alternate history/steampunk) – mad scientists, detectives, general paranormal activity, feisty females, and a little (but not too much) romance. Oh, and did I mention it also features a primitive version of Skynet?
When you throw all of the above mentioned features together and put it into an accessible YA package, you have my heart for life. This is a great adventure and relief to read – I was afraid that it might be too stereotypically chick-lit in terms of the romance area (considering the publisher being Harlequin and all), but Cross writes it in so subtly that you’re halfway in before you figure out what’s going on between Finley and Griff. And that itself is a breath of fresh air when you consider anything with romance in the realm of YA, especially as of late.
All of these elements are hard to get right by themselves, much less when you throw them together and make a delicious soup like this one.
And then there’s the mystery element – who is the machinist? What are his objectives? Cross subtly builds up the tension between the romance and the appearances of Jack Dandy (Jack the Ripper), along with trying to keep Finley’s head (and soul) together yet balances all of these things with the talent of someone from Cirque du Soleil. And the primitive version of Skynet robots killing (or horribly maiming) people! I enjoyed all aspects of this book, and can find no faults at all with it. And coming from me? I guess that’s high praise, seeing how picky I am and all.
Aside from the novella that’s just been released, I really hope that this isn’t the last full-length book set in Cross’ finely constructed ‘verse. I’ll be reviewing the novella as well, but I’ll still be waiting for news on a second book. More like squirming in my seat like a five year old, but you get the idea.
Want some steampunk that’s empowering for girls? Pick up “The Girl in the Steel Corset”. Afterwards, you’ll want a steel corset of your very own.
(crossposted to shelfari, goodreads, librarything, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
(review from witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com, posted to librarything, goodreads, inreads, shelfari)
This has been on my tbr list since last year, before the cover came up. The idea of curing cancer and damning the human race to extinction tasted a bit of “The Children of Men” (if you’re a fan of “Wither”, you simply MUST read “Children of Men”) and a bit of “Big Love” and the TLC show, “Sister Wives”. Combine all of this together? One amazingly wonderful clusterfuck of a horrifying future that just seems all too real and possible, especially these days.
Apotheosis: the process in which cells die and thus prevent conditions like cancer from happening within the body of any living creature. If you cure this process without any substitute for cells to age and recycle out of the system, you come up with a nightmare scenario that DeStefano has created in her new trilogy, “Wither”.
I won’t lie – I finished “Wither” in more or less one sitting. I literally could NOT put it down. I love dystopia-themed books, and the idea of sister wives fascinates me to no end (no thanks to my brief stint as a mormon as a child – don’t ask). This book is most definitely not for the squeamish, starting out with a bang (literally, and many of them) for our heroine, Rhine, and the girls who come to be her sister wives in the household of Linden and Vaughn. The idea of having to become breeding stock is abhorrent to any modern female these days (and I know I’m not the only one who feels this way, obviously), and there were parts of this book where I had to put it down for a few moments before picking it back up again just to process the sheer obscenity and horror of having girls as young as 13 (or younger) being used as incubators for fetuses.
But I think this is what DeStefano was aiming for – to really visit the horror of this world where everything looks and feels pretty on the outside, but is completely rotten on the inside upon the reader, to impress upon the audience the sheer helplessness of the feeling of the timebomb in one’s body, knowing exactly, more or less, how long you’re going to live, knowing what your worth is based on your fertility.
Frankly, in a world where we’re trying to find cures to all diseases possible, DeStefano has balls for writing this book. And I give her major props for this – it takes a lot of bravery to speak up and say “well, uh, we uh, might need diseases so things like this scenario won’t happen”.
To say that I’m anxious for the next book is putting it lightly. Definitely one of the best of 2011, hands down. I know I’ll be rereading it quite a bit over the next year.
I think the question of “Is borrowing a book piracy?” is an interesting one. We own the physical book and can do with as we please. However, we do not own the content and the digital age makes that clear.
I also think the publishers need to be careful because I would bet that the people pirating books are also the people buying books. My friend justifies his piracy by only stealing books he would never purchase. If he likes the book then he’s more apt to buy a different book by that author and tell people about it.
Great post. This whole online presence thing seems to be extending beyond authors or other creative types to all kinds of jobs. Even computer programmers (the old term for app developers) are starting to build a reputation online that they take to the workplace.
Hi Liz,
Point #3 here is right on the money. I’m seeing writers use age old networking skills via social media, blogs, etc. and connecting with bloggers, journalists and others in and out of publishing who have an eye out for great writing and/or new writers. Still, it gets down to great writing in my view. Mastery ans use of all the cool new channels won’t do much for you if the writing isn’t sale-able. In my opinion. I really really hope my fellow techie pals/writers realize this beforehand.
The cover of my (Ballantine) edition touts this as “The GREATEST WAR NOVEL OF ALL TIME.” (with the “The” mostly lower case, for some reason.)
That’s quite a claim, but one I heartily agree with. I’m working on a book about soldiers, and the first thing I did was plunge back into reading this, 25 years later.
I wondered if it would still hold up for me. Was it just a youthful literary love affair, or was it all about my timing? (I read it while I was on active duty in the U.S. Infantry.)
Still stunning. The translation can be clunky at times (eg, all the ten-dollar words inserted in place of “said.”) But I brush those off.
I keep a list on my wall labeled, “WHEN I GET STUCK.” (Stuck writing.) #4 is Read something amazing. I have this book in mind. I dive back in and in under a page I’m inspired by how glorious great writing can be.
Nabokov is the master, and this is his greatest work. Sentence after sentence amazes me. I could drink it in endlessly.
This infuriated me for about 50 pages, then it clicked and amazed me. So glad I kept going.
It was a stunning feat to pull off all the shifting first-person narrators, but not stunt-writing by a longshot. Seeing the world through such drastically different points of view were a revelation: about this story and about storytelling.
I read the book just as I was reconceiving “Columbine,” and it gave me the courage to try something different, but daunting: ten storylines. I’ll be forever grateful.
This is one of my all-time favorites. If I can ever write with the clarity, vividness and human insight of Denis, I will die a happy man.
I have this as my first quote on my facebook page. Extraordinary:
“Down the hall came the wife. She was glorious, burning. She didn’t know yet that her husband was dead. We knew. That’s what gave her so much power over us. The doctor took her into a room with a desk at the end of the hall, and from under the closed door a slab of brilliance radiated as if, by some stupendous process, diamonds were being incinerated in there. What a pair of lungs! She shrieked as I imagined an eagle would shriek. It felt wonderful to be alive to hear it! I’ve gone looking for that feeling everywhere.” — Denis Johnson, Car Crash While Hitchhiking
I like this idea. You may have some push back from bookstores though. I recently went to a signing and the author was only allowed to sign books purchased at that bookstore (A receipt was required). There was also a disclaimer stating that no signing of e-readers of any kind was allowed.
“I’ve confessed to everything and I’d like to be hanged. Now, if you please.” This is the first line and it only gets better.
The book is disorienting in that it takes place in a swamp during the turn of the last century outside of London. It evokes feelings of New Orleans rather than London but it reminds of Julia Robert’s face. The individual pieces aren’t beautiful but when you bring them all together, they’re remarkable.
That’s this book. It’s disorienting, gruesome and beautiful all at the time.
If you like your YA to have witches, folklore and love then read it.
Yeah, agreed. The end was abrupt, but such is the nature of tabloids, I reckon. When I went to talk with him, I actually brought a copy of the Library of America writings of A.J. Liebling (which Pete edited). I love that about him that he can swim comfortably in so many different subjects, be it journalism, fiction, sports, comics, art or anything else that he finds interesting. A generalist, and a gentleman.
Amazing insight into the Anorexic mindframe. Exquisitely written and deeply personal. I highly recommend it, especially for teenage girls, or any woman who has or is struggling with body image or eating disorders. Don’t skip the epilogue!
Lucille, your entry could have gone either way (posts vs. thoughts) – the real key was linking it to the book so that anyone who clicks there (like me!) can learn more about it.
I got mildly obsessed with Columbine after reading Wally Lamb’s “The Hour I First Believed” so will definitely be getting Dave’s book to learn from his first-hand account. When Columbine happened, I thought about it in terms of “What if I had been a student that day?” but now as a parent I think “What if my kids were in the school that day?” The more information I have to process all of that, the better!
Thanks for the info, Wendy and Clint. I had no idea Google got it wrong, and was/is propogating the mistake throughout the web universe.
It took awhhile, but I finally found a place on Google to report the problem. (It’s frustrating to deal with the great automated void. I’ve been down this road with Amazon before. Like reasoning with a brick wall.)
I’m going to jump right in. InReads looks like a great site. First question, is it best to post comments under “thoughts” or “posts?”
I was a bit nervous to pick this book up and read it, but since I know the author and live in Littleton, I tippy-toed in.
I was hooked from page one. I felt like Dave described everything about my hometown, the school, the neighborhoods, the churches,and the people the way an alien would. As an outside observer telling you what it was like. Yet he portrays an authentic version of what unfolded.
Dave is a gifted writer. This book reads like fiction – in the genre of “In Cold Blood” — but sadly, we know the events really took place.
Dave was one of the first on the scene that day. He investigated, interviewed, wrote, and immersed himself into the story for almost ten years before this book was published.
I know lots of other people who, like me, were afraid to read it, but almost all were glad they did. Many of my friends are writers and/or agents. Almost all gave it a thumbs up.
One more thing…Even though this book contains difficult material, it is also filled with stories of hope and heroism.
As with any business venture, you have to protect yourself and know exactly what is going to be required of you. Writing is a hard job and with overhead like Frey’s company has, it doesn’t sound like his writers are getting much out of the company. Self-publishing seems pretty lucrative now!
Wendy is right. The search is powered by Google Search. You can visit this page though to report an issue regarding the metadata stored for a specific book:
Hi Dave,
The search is powered by Google so I’m thinking the error is in the Google database somehow, but let me double check that. Thanks for noting it!
I’m mom to an amazing 20 month old; my reading shelf at the moment consists of Goodnight Moon, Curious George, and Where the Wild Things Are…to name just a few. One book I’ve gotten to re-read with her is “The Giving Tree” by Shel Silverstein. As an adult, I have a whole new respect for his body of work!
Andrew.Toal posted on
June 18, 2011
Weird! I just started piecing through this again myself.
Sitting in Dubai airport during an 8hr transit I faced some 20 people across the way – every single one busy with an ereader, phone or laptop/notebook. Not a single book in sight. My paperback fell to pieces, the glue having turned a bit old …makes you think.
“The Great Gatsby” is probably the one novel that I read every year and never start to get sick of. It makes me want to get in a time machine and go back to eastern Long Island circa 1921 and then douse the time machine in water so I never have to leave.
Here’s my beef. I am NOT excited about the Great Gatsby movie. I think Baz Luhrmann butchered his 1996 take on “Romeo and Juliet” and rumor is that Blake Lively, of “Gossip Girl” is going to play Daisy. But I don’t think she’s quite sophisticated enough to take on such a nuanced character. The problem is, I can’t think of any other actress who I’d be happy to see play Daisy… except Meryl Streep. And that won’t work.
Am I just being cranky or does this movie already sound like it will do such an injustice to the perfect book?
Oh my Goodness, what a powerful interview. Kudos to Janet Garber for asking such good questions. I almost envy Jennifer Haigh because, as a writer, I find it immensely lonely and isolating, and sometimes I wish I had the personality that could succeed as a retail clerk or bank teller or some career that would have me interacting with people every minute of every day (or perhaps I wish I could be a loner, like Haigh, and just write and feel okay). Alas, I feel like Haigh in that I, too, can’t do anything but write!
TOO funny! And I think the intertextual approach, that the video and the images and the poems and the general wonky effects really make the words spring out at you.
Becca, that’s a great point about YA getting dated, but imagine how dated today’s YA is going to seem… in 5 years! I feel like there is more product placement and mentioning of bands and brands and products that might not be as well known in the near future (and I feel like there was much, much less of that in Blume’s books).
I was just thinking the other night that an update for a lot of the great books we, and kids since the 60s, have read. Books like Are You There God? and Forever, deal with great subject matter, but are soooooo dated, especially for kids of today. They were dated when we were teens, but the world has evolved at a much greater pace than it did in the 80s. Time to re-write some Blume!
It is interesting that language is so free in YA books, but gets movies like The King’s Speech an R rating.
Your two cents is on the money. I love your scenario where someone tries to sell “Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret” in today’s market. I agree that there is a lot of escapist, high-concept YA out there.
All the more reason to support YA writers who want to change lives and to give them kudos for taking a collective stand when they felt like the entire industry was maligned.
The bookstore/eatery model can work and I hope they do well. In Washington DC, we have KramerBooks, a fixture in the Dupont Circle neighborhood and the more recent (and very successful) Busboys and Poets.
GREAT article. In fact, I like this reaction to the WSJ piece much better than I liked the original WSJ piece, so kudos to you! I have three main reactions to this discussion of contemporary YA.
1. I admire YA writers for how they collectively reacted to the WSJ article and took to Twitter and to their blogs and stood up for their industry (after all, YA today essentially is an industry). I also just generally admire YA writers; I think they’re the best at building a community around their work, using technology to promote themselves, and making themselves accessible to their fans.
2. However, I think a lot of YA today is just, well… crap. While the last chapters of most YA books (especially those geared towards girls) end on a note of accepting who you are, they’re really not relatable at all, because the protagonists either lead some kind of glamorous life or a double-life (as a princess, assassin, whatever…). I was reading this one YA fiction book in college–I’m straining to remember what the title was–and in one scene, these three teens in Manhattan for the summer were hanging out at the uber-trendy bar “Milk and Honey.” At the time, I was 20, and I was like, “OK, I have 3 fake IDs and none of them would work at Milk and Honey.” They even card obvious adults at Milk and Honey. And it’s little details like that, that add up to make a lot of today’s YA not at all relatable for today’s teens. It’s escapist–it doesn’t really reflect the teen experience.
3. However, this may not necessarily be the writers’ fault. There is such a push today to write very commercial high-concept YA fiction or YA fiction that can easily be parlayed into a series (presumably at the behest of publishers). Because of it, we’re really risking losing enduring teen literature. I think if an author tried to shop a book about a girl that moves from the city to the suburbs and struggles to come to terms with her religious beliefs and her bra size (“Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret”), publishers might say, “Cool… but what if she secretly fought zombies by night?”
I’m sick of being told that I shouldn’t be carrying around books, I should have an e-reader. How about everyone just stfu and mind their own business? What’s it to the bartender what you read on?
`I guess action movie cliches would require it’s own seperate shape. So many there but I gotta go – there’s only 20 seconds left before the bomb goes off and I have to decide which wire to cut!
I like lip-locking in the rain! There’s really nothing enduring about “The Notebook” movie, but that kiss will live on forever.
I also like “catch her at the station” because usually, in those scenes, the women are wearing amazing vintage outfits–swirling skirts and crepe-y scarves to protect their hair–and they’re carrying hatboxes. And then there’s usually a kiss, but not usually in the rain. So cute.
Hello
I am in the middle of tell tale lovely story
Liz posted on
May 27, 2011
Great article! Personally, if the right dude took me out for a nice dinner and then took me to the New York Public Library for reading/whispering in the Rose Reading Room and kissed me goodnight in front of the lions, I’d probably stick with him for awhile.
This is really interesting. I’ve heard a great deal about both the pros and cons of self-publishing. But I still have quite a bit of time before I’m ready for that step.
While playing Knights of the Old Republic some years ago, I had to stop playing for a couple of days to decide whether I should join the Dark Side and reclaim my mantle of Dark Lord. I was bartending at the time, and asked pretty much everyone who came in what I should do. In the end, I had to do what was right for the galaxy. The Jedi never knew what hit them.
I wanted to read this play because I watched the film and it was awesome! It stars Julia Roberts, Natalie Portman, Jude Law, and Clive Owen. It starts off a bit like a love story, but I assure you it’s more than that. This film, based upon Marber’s play, really makes you think about relationships, love, fidelity, honesty and deception. While watching it I just knew it had to be based upon a piece of literature because every line was thoughtfully crafted…no filler cliche phrases. I thought that by reading, I could see how the play and film compare and satisfy my inner English nerd. Adaptations are always so fun to analayze!
Michael Henderson (@jamofpearls) posted on May 10, 2013
Thanks for such a nice write up of my wife. She’s a terrific person.
In response to A Breath Of Fresh Air, Turned Up To Eleven
Kelly @ Turned up to Eleven! posted on May 10, 2013
Hey Lindsay – thanks SO much for the kind words and bomb ass write up! I love it. I have a draft in my outbox waiting to finish writing to you. Thanks for this, well done!!!
P.S. The Redskins are my 2nd favorite team. My father is PA born and raised but roots for the Skins, and always have. I never forget the love of my home team but since HS I’ve been an avid Steelers fan
Ravens, no way, no how!
In response to A Breath Of Fresh Air, Turned Up To Eleven
Leanne Tankel posted on May 1, 2013
I have thoroughly enjoyed reading Ron Charles’ reviews in the Washington Post, so I am thrilled to be introduced to this side of his work! Thank you again, InReads, for bringing your readers something thought provoking, entertaining, and downright DC:)
Leanne Tankel (author of perhaps the first self published book that RC will review???)
In response to Sh*t One Extraordinary Book Reviewer Says
inReads posted on August 28, 2012
And the winner is…To Kill A Mockingbird!!
See how it all went down: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/22/what-is-the-best-novel-ever-written_n_1821952.html
In response to inBlogs: Best Novel of All Time – Vote!
Jon posted on July 12, 2012
Thanks for the comment Kristan. Knowing your taste a little bit, I think you would appreciate the book far more than the film!
In response to Page to Screen: Savages
Jon posted on July 12, 2012
Love this website. Thanks for the recommendation.
In response to A Fun Game with A Funny Name: Sporcle
Kristan posted on July 11, 2012
To be honest, this isn’t the type of movie I’d typically watch anyway, so your well-written critiques aren’t causing Stone to lose a customer. (I’m sure he’d be relieved to know.) But I love your discussion of the original novel — and now I kind of want to read the book! Thanks.
In response to Page to Screen: Savages
Judy Jonas posted on July 6, 2012
One of the few contemporary novels I’ve read in recent years.
Your review captures its beauty and its essence.
In response to American Hamlet: The Story of Edgar Sawtelle
Marlene Kimura posted on June 27, 2012
Guys should check out http://www.Formvote.com , it’s a new social network. Pretty awesome.
In response to With Social Media, There’s Always Room at the Table
Karen Tolar posted on June 18, 2012
Could not make it past page 100 or so.
In response to Skippy Dies, A Novel
Karen Tolar posted on June 18, 2012
Very good book. I listened to it on audio CD and the to hear it read by the “voice” of a little boy enhanced it even more. The subject of the book was so disturbing, I almost didn’t get it, but I’m glad I did.
In response to Room, a novel
Karen Tolar posted on June 18, 2012
I read this after I read a blog post about 25% of our genes being patented. Although it is fiction, it is frightening to think of what lengths a pharmaceutical company would go to in an effort to exploit a person’s DNA potential. I very much enjoyed this book.
In response to Calypso Directive: A Novel
Doug posted on June 16, 2012
Good writer, good book. I bet the sequel does well too!
In response to Marc Waldman and His Hero, Mac
Aishah Bowron posted on June 9, 2012
Bloody evil genocidal murderer and slaver trader is what Christopher Columbus really was !. I fucking hate him !. Why is there an holiday for a guy who brought death, destruction, violence and pain to the Americas ?. So abolish Columbus Day !. Abolish it now !.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Columbus – Someone to Celebrate?
Jon posted on June 7, 2012
Thanks for the read, Kristan!
In response to Page to Screen: The Dictator
Kristan posted on June 4, 2012
I had zero intention of watching The Dictator, but I had never even heard of ZABIBA/H. Thanks for a great review, as well as additional insight into the material! This was a very interesting read.
In response to Page to Screen: The Dictator
Judy Jonas posted on June 2, 2012
What a line up of great authors! Can’t wait to read both books by
Smith and Young…
In response to Book Expo America 2012
Judy Jonas posted on June 2, 2012
So glad you started our thinking about summer with the combination
of MUIR and MOUNTAINS. Inspired choice.
In response to onVacation: Climb the Mountains with Muir
Jane Jonas posted on May 29, 2012
Mom, I think you would like it. Give it a try. It’s on your Kindle Archived Items. xoxo
In response to inSide Books: The Fault in Our Stars
Meg @ A Bookish Affair posted on May 29, 2012
I also blogged about the article. Great food for thought!
Link:
http://abookishaffair.blogspot.com/2012/05/ebooks-from-library.html
In response to Click to Borrow, or Click to Buy: Your Choice is Making Publishers Nervous
Meg @ A Bookish Affair posted on May 29, 2012
I can see why publishers would want to raise prices on ebooks. They’re interested in making money. It’s all about business.
I guess the most palatable idea (and none of them are that palatable) of maybe charging a fee for the library to re-purchase books after a certain number of uses.
In response to Click to Borrow, or Click to Buy: Your Choice is Making Publishers Nervous
Judy Jonas posted on May 25, 2012
Although I’m not usually motivated to read cancer stories,
this review was very intriguing.
In response to inSide Books: The Fault in Our Stars
Jenn Lawrence posted on May 15, 2012
Spot-on recommendations. Having read them all myself, my personal favorite would have to be THE COLOR OF WATER. So profound.
In response to inRetro: How About Mothers and Sons?
cqueen716 posted on May 14, 2012
Yes, of course people don’t necessarily intend to read 3,500 books on their Kindle… There is no “mystery” surrounding that. People just want the ability to choose what they want to read and at any given moment. It’s just like going for a 60 minute walk with 30 hours worth of music on your iPod. Many take their iPod with 30 hours worth of music along anyway. Many people like the luxury of choosing any song they might want to listen to and whenever that desire strikes.
In response to E-Reader Reality Check: 4 Limitations to Consider
deidre posted on May 11, 2012
http://pursuitist.com/arts/exploring-the-legacy-of-the-kentucky-derby/
In response to The Kentucky Derby, How the Run for the Roses Became America’s Premier Sporting Event
Jon posted on April 27, 2012
Hmm…I didn’t see that! Is it worth checking out?
In response to Page to Screen: What to Expect When You’re Adapting
Sharon M. posted on April 24, 2012
I’m not a writer, but I reaaly enjoyed reading about your experience.
In response to My First (Literary) Speed Date
Joyce posted on April 23, 2012
There is definitely an anti-religious bias among the Amazon reviewers. People complain about any Christian content (even if the words “God” or “Jesus” appear in the title–and xxx forbid there should be Christian content without a warning label ahead of time). And if a reviewer dares to defend the religious content of a work, they better be prepared to have their review marked down as “not helpful”.
In response to inTouch: Are Amazon Customer Reviews Biased? Do We Care?
Jon posted on April 23, 2012
I’ve just started this book, and this is my first Sigler novel, but I am impressed with his craftsmanship. He doesn’t waste a word, and is keeping me entertained and interested the entire time.
I love that he includes details that make you question the reality of the setting, but spends most of the time entertaining the reader with realistic, well-researched writing!
In response to Nocturnal, A Novel
Jada Bradley posted on April 23, 2012
What did you think of the movie based on “He’s Just Not That Into You?”
In response to Page to Screen: What to Expect When You’re Adapting
Rosie Forbes posted on April 22, 2012
This is a great read. Have a look at the Guardian article which captures the essence of the book beautifully. I haven’t finished it yet, but I’ve had trouble putting it down!
In response to Snowdrops by AD Miller – review | Books | The Guardian
inReads posted on April 22, 2012
Sounds like a special night…we’re happy to help spread the word!
In response to Three Divas of the D.C. Poetry Scene
inReads posted on April 22, 2012
@Sharon, please email info@inreads.com. We’d be very interested to know more about Washington Ear and share it with other inReaders. Thank you!
In response to Technology for Reading Long Embraced by the Blind and Physically Handicapped
L Clark posted on April 22, 2012
Thanks for posting. We had a great time at Busboys and Poets. Sheema Kalbasi could not attend. Alyse Knorr poetry editor for So to Speak filled in. Sarah Browning, Siwar Masannat and Alyse lead a discussion on the great things Split this Rock Poetry Festival and So to Speak Feminist Journal are making an impact on poetry in the community. Poetry was shared by the panelist and a spirited open mic closed the program out. The DC poetry scene is alive and well thanks to these great ladies!
In response to Three Divas of the D.C. Poetry Scene
Sharon Salus posted on April 22, 2012
Are you acquainted with the Washington Ear? It’s service for the visually impaired that provide oral reading of the Washington Post, USA Today, and excerpts from other publications daily, that listeners can access by phone or by a special radio? I’d be glad to share the information with anyone interested.
Sharon Salus
In response to Technology for Reading Long Embraced by the Blind and Physically Handicapped
P.L. Frederick posted on March 29, 2012
Keith fans: Will you help support his true graphic novel, “I Was A Teenage Michael Jackson Impersonator!”? Learn more by going to his Kickstarter page. Hurry, your chance ends at 3 pm EST on April 6, 2012!
In response to inVideos: Cartoonist Keith Knight Talks Comics and Animal Farm
Andy posted on March 28, 2012
I spent my whole weekend filling out my brackets for the Hunger Games — Jay Leno
In response to Page to Screen: The Hunger Games
Jon posted on March 28, 2012
Thanks Andy for the comment, and the link, I just checked it out.
In response to Page to Screen: The Hunger Games
Andy posted on March 28, 2012
Loved the book, loved the movie but but as is with so many adaptations was distracted by the deviations. Of course, knowing more of the back story adds to the experience as well, though I’ve told many it’s not necessary to read the book(s) before seeing the movie. Here’s another review that hits on some key points:
http://lostangelesblog.wordpress.com/2012/03/26/my-review-of-the-hunger-games/
In response to Page to Screen: The Hunger Games
Jon posted on March 27, 2012
In certain ways, The Hunger Games glorifies violence, but in other ways, especially through its ending, the filmmakers seem to be glorifying pacifism (don’t worry, no spoilers). All in all, I would recommend seeing The Hunger Games.
In response to Page to Screen: The Hunger Games
writer-at-heart posted on March 27, 2012
Do you recommend seeing it? Does it glorify violence?
In response to Page to Screen: The Hunger Games
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
In Kieran Shields’ superb new novel, “The Truth of All Things,” brilliant but troubled private detective Perceval Grey is aptly named. Being of mixed American Indian and Caucasian racial heritages, he’s forced to battle deeply ingrained late 19th century New England prejudices, even in his own family. Grey is indeed a gray man in the society he lives and works in — neither an Indian, nor a white man, but straddling some murky, shifting ground in between. At times during an investigation of horrific murders tied to the infamous Salem witch hunts that happened 200 years earlier, Grey’s mixed race is a valuable asset. Mostly, though, Grey finds himself forced to confront an array of bigotries to save the very people who belittle him from an unholy conspiracy that attempts to resurrect in their town’s midst a long-dead evil.
Grey’s mannerisms and methodologies will quickly remind readers of those of his contemporary across the Atlantic, Sherlock Holmes. Grey’s a keenly astute and dispassionate observer, as aware of the facts in front of him as he is of the ones not present that others around him mistakenly presume. Along with his colleagues, Portland Deputy Marshall Archie Lean, Dr. Virgil Steig, and Steig’s niece the local librarian/historian Helen Prescott, Grey scours Maine and its environs for clues both ancient and fresh to stop the murder spree. From the moment a prostitute’s body is found dead late one night in the middle of a massive machine shop, pinned to the ground by a pitchfork thrust through her throat, the detectives’ investigations propel them from churches to brothels to libraries to graveyards to seedy bars to lunatic asylums via foot, trains and hansom cabs. Shields obviously did a lot of painstaking research to do such a great job deftly conveying settings in New England as they were 120 years ago. All of his main characters, good guys and bad, are multidimensional, and they speak in dialogue that’s well written and authentic. In addition to those accomplishments, the book’s plot is a nonstop careening ride from start to finish, crafted with enough breakneck twists and turns to keep readers guessing literally until the story’s very end.
“The Truth of All Things” is one of the best books I’ve read in a while, and I’m happy at its conclusion Shields leaves room for the return of Perceval Grey in a future adventure. Until that sequel comes, mystery and thriller fans will do themselves a big favor treating themselves to this excellent debut work by a very talented new author.
In response to The Truth of All Things, A Novel
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
The roots of Christopher Buehlman’s novel, “Those Across the River,” are tangled inextricably in the classic Southern Gothic literary tradition. Emblematic of the best of the genre, Buehlman’s writing is as elegant as it is powerful. Through deft choices of language, idiom, place and pace, he conveys well the cadence of life in the American South at a time the country teetered between the first and second World Wars, the Great Depression raged with seeming immortality, and the American Civil War remained a deep, haunting wound far from healed in formerly Confederate states.
Retreating from Chicago and the professional and personal ruin wrought by their indiscreet adultery, Frank and Eudora alight in Whitbrow, a tiny Georgia town, to take possession of a house willed Frank by his recently deceased aunt. Rejecting his aunt’s warning not to live in her bequest but instead to sell it immediately, Frank and Eudora begin settling in the quaint yellow house, which is separated by a small river and a large forest from his family’s ancestral family plantation. Frank is descended from a notorious Confederate officer who evaded Union bullets only to die brutally at the hands of his own slaves, on his own plantation. In an attempt to right his shattered life both in the aftermath of Chicago, and of his ghastly experiences as a doughboy fighting in bloody French trenches, Frank comes to Whitbrow to explore the remnants of the estate with an eye to writing a definitive history of the plantation and the infamous man who owned it. Yet despite the decades that have passed since the plantation’s demise, it’s not uninhabited. To the contrary, it has been waiting patiently for Frank’s arrival, as have its handful of infernal denizens who smelled Frank and Eudora coming long before they fled Chicago.
Fans of Southern Gothic tales will love “Those Across the River,” as will admirers of shrewd writing. Buehlman’s storytelling is captivating, and unsettling. It’s a very good book.
In response to Those Across the River
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Look at the people around you. Repeated national surveys say the people you’re looking at dread speaking in public more than flying, illness, terrorism, and even death. Comedian Jerry Seinfeld once summarized the data by quipping, “In other words, at a funeral, the average person would rather be in the casket than giving the eulogy.”
If the notion of speaking in front of any crowd intimidates you, imagine it’s your job to make a paying audience full of expectant strangers ranging from mildly skeptical onlookers to immoderately inebriated hecklers laugh at your jokes. Keep that in mind when treating yourself to author Alan Orloff’s mystery novel, “Killer Routine.” Set mostly in the northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C., “Killer Routine” is the first entry in Orloff’s “Last Laff” series, spotlighting the amateur sleuthing of troubled stand-up comedian and comedy club-owner Channing Hayes. This well-written novel bursts open with the alarming disappearance of Heather Dempsey, Hayes’ protégée (and sister of his late fiancée, Lauren), just before she’s to make her debut appearance at Hayes’ struggling suburban comedy club. Still reeling from Lauren’s untimely death and while battling a hostile takeover attempt aimed at his nightclub, Hayes maneuvers among an escalating pile of lies and murders to find Heather and save her life before she’s victimized in a twisted plot of cold vengeance. This is no funny story, no amusing satire — the book’s tone is dark, as are the natures of many of its principal characters. In addition to spinning a gripping mystery story, “Killer Routine” gives readers a fascinating glimpse into the daunting world inhabited by the men and women who stand alone sweating under piercing floodlights on unforgiving comedy stages the world over, desperately lunging for every laugh they can get.
In response to Killer Routine
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
“Threat Warning” is the third and latest entry in veteran bestselling thriller author John Gilstrap’s series featuring tough-guy hero Jonathan “Digger” Grave. Fans of Gilstrap and Grave will be hard-pressed to put this exhilarating book down before finishing it in a single sitting, as will thriller fans just discovering the author and/or the character. Gilstrap rivets attention from the novel’s electrifying first chapter, and from there the action barrels full tilt right up to the story’s taut climax.
The opening scene explodes with a firefight on the Wilson Bridge during a typical rush hour on a cold November evening in Washington, D.C. The Wilson Bridge onslaught was preceded by one at a shopping mall in Kansas City, and is followed quickly by a bombing at a Detroit middle school as terrorists wage war against the United States on American soil. Meanwhile, before the gun smoke clears from the combat on the bridge, one of the terrorist shooters escapes by carjacking a military wife’s minivan and kidnapping the woman and her teen-aged son, soon delivering them to captivity at the terrorists’ remote compound in rural West Virginia. The price of sparing the hostages’ lives is the immediate withdrawal of all U.S. forces in Afghanistan and the Middle East. Gilstrap keeps the tension mounting relentlessly as the formidable Grave and his small but resourceful team battle to thwart a terrorist sniper plot that threatens to demolish the government and obliterate America’s financial system.
Gilstrap writes well, in a style that’s smart, crisp and engaging. He sets scenes with sufficient detail to put the readers right alongside his characters as heroes and villains clash in both urban and rural settings. He crafts realistic and believable dialogue. Though some of Gilstrap’s characters are a little flat, he earns kudos for avoiding the tendency of many modern thriller writers to sacrifice depth and complexity in even principal characters on the altar of propelling plots. The overall effect is an addictive and satisfying read, and a chilling story that feels disturbingly close to one that might erupt in America at any moment.
In response to Threat Warning
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
As he demonstrates in his absorbing new thriller, “Thick as Thieves,” Peter Spiegelman is a truly gifted writer. His prose is elegant, nuanced and smooth, filled with canny dialogue, shrewd turns of phrase, and intimately insightful descriptions of both place and person. Bestseller lists are replete with serviceable thrillers telling stories that are good enough to hold a reader’s interest sheerly via an uptempo plot and lots of action. The best of the genre, however, captivate not only by crafting an interesting story that’s well-paced, but by writing skillful enough to create an almost visceral feel for the story’s mood every time a reader cracks open the book. “Thick as Thieves” is a stellar example of the latter. It’s impossible to read Spiegelman’s latest novel without palpable feelings of paranoia, betrayal and doom creeping inside you from every page.
Carr is a CIA dropout who subsequently leaves his international private security firm gig by accepting an unexpected invitation to join a small clutch of artful, violent thieves. The group steals huge amounts of money exclusively from the world’s wealthiest malefactors — “drug runners, gun runners, whore runners, human smugglers, kidnappers — the very worst swine.” When the man whose invitation Carr accepted dies in a Chilean gambit gone murderously wrong, Carr’s gifts for meticulous planning, keen observation, and astute foresight propel him to the group’s leadership, although not by unanimous or unwavering acclaim. The next job is to empty the accounts of an international money launderer based in the Grand Cayman. If all goes to plan, that job will be the biggest and last one standing between the group and luxurious retirement. It’s no spoiler to say all does not go to plan.
In addition to being an intense and compelling thriller, at its heart “Thick as Thieves” raises disturbing questions about how real is what seems so clearly true of the people we know best, including the person gazing back at you from your mirror. Spiegelman’s book reminds us that the realities we spend lifetimes carefully constructing around ourselves are very fragile things, and only to the utterly naive is seeing necessarily believing.
In response to Thick as Thieves
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Author Gerald Griffin displays noteworthy chops in forging his debut thriller, “Of Good and Evil.” His principal characters are vivid, vibrant and troubled, and sufficiently well-crafted to allow readers to root for them. In lesser hands, that many of the main characters are gifted with varying degrees of paranormal perceptivity might detract from other elements of the story, but that’s not so in this novel. To his credit, Griffin’s handling of those characters’ exceptional abilities is understated rather than bombastic. The book’s plot gallops from start to finish without a dull moment thanks to the author’s excellent sense of pacing. Through lush language and rapt attention to detail, Griffin is particularly adept at setting the scenes in which the characters toil against an array of villains both fictional, and ripped from international headlines. The thriller’s gripping climax pits the main characters in an intense race against dwindling time and unspeakable catastrophe to stop a terrorist sleeper cell from annihilating a major American city. As the title suggests, the entirety of this timely story encourages questioning rote notions of good versus evil, from perspectives personal to geopolitical. I’m looking forward to the sequel.
In response to Of Good and Evil
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Matt Richtel, author of the superb novel “Devil’s Plaything,” is a Pulitzer Prize-winning technology reporter for the New York Times. “Devil’s Plaything” is far and away among the very best thrillers released this year. It’s timely, insightful, and disturbingly prescient.
San Francisco in present-day late October is the setting for a breakneck plot twisting around attempts to hijack an elderly woman’s memories under the auspices of a seemingly benign government-sponsored endeavor called the Human Memory Crusade. On its surface, the Crusade is designed to preserve for future generations the life stories of the elderly before dementia or death wipe them from mankind’s record. At a time when mean human life expectancies inexorably rise in virtual lockstep with the ever-increasing onset of material memory impairment among the aged, the Crusade appears a noble pursuit. However, under the untoward influence of potentially sinister multinational neuro-tech companies, quasi-sentient computer software, suspect elder care facilities, shadowy venture capitalists, and even menacing dental offices, the pursuit’s nobility is subject to question.
Richtel tells the story well and almost entirely in first-person, present tense. This gives the novel a breathtaking sense of immediacy, and makes the action insistent and compelling. A mood of deep, gnawing paranoia almost drips from the book’s pages. No one and nothing are as they appear, except when they are, and it’s no easy task for readers to surmise which is which until the novel’s conclusion. Like his crisp dialogue, Richtel’s characters ring true. The author is particularly masterful in presenting the narrator’s elderly grandmother, a principal character who braves the ravages of dementia as she tries to help her grandson navigate multiplying treacheries and deathtraps. Richtel’s portrayal of this unduly tormented old woman is deft, sensitive, accurate, and alone worth reading the novel.
At its core, “Devil’s Plaything” is a story about memory, duality, and the intercourse between the two that pulses in us all. It’s a fantastic thriller, and I can’t recommend it strongly enough.
In response to Devil’s Plaything
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Michael Crichton’s posthumously published 2006 novel “Pirate Latitudes” is a light and engaging book. Had he the chance to revisit this book before publication, it might have ranked with some of his best work. Sadly, it’s apparent Crichton didn’t get around to polishing the novel prior to his passing, and the book has a makeshift feel. Some of the characters are flat, others are merely stereotypical of the swashbuckler genre. Only a few of them have sufficient meat on their bones to hold the reader’s attention and care. The plot sails quickly, but it’s burdened with a bit too much prosaic piratical ballast that Crichton likely would have refined, if not deleted entirely, upon rewrite. Nonetheless, Crichton was a great storyteller and a skilled writer, and particularly for his admirers, the book’s worth reading. I recommend doing so while reclining on a sunny shore, with warm sand trickling between your toes, and a vast expanse of deep blue sea stretching before you to a distant, cloudless horizon. “Pirate Latitudes” is a good beach read, but no more memorable than that.
In response to Pirate Latitudes
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Whether as man or myth, arguably no one since Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. has more profoundly affected American daily life than Osama bin Laden. As author Michael Scheuer argues cogently in his new biography of bin Laden, since his formal declaration of war against the United States in 1996, bin Laden has deliberately drawn America into armed conflicts of varying durations but substantial costs in Africa, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Since past is present’s prologue, likely bin Laden will goad further American military action in the turmoils currently roiling north Africa and the Middle East. Using a plethora of authoritative sources, including most importantly the words and writings of bin Laden himself, Scheuer demonstrates that bin Laden attempts these manipulations to lure America into ruinous wars where victory is ever elusive but the prolonged loss of American blood and treasure is assured. In this concise and well-written book, former chief of the CIA’s bin Laden unit Scheuer presents a compelling argument that American political, military and media leaders are engaged in mortal combat with a fabricated enemy of their own creation and preference, instead of with bin Laden himself. Scheuer’s book is a valiant effort to present bin Laden the man, rather than the phantasm he’s become in many American minds. Only when America understands the man and his true motives, strengths and limitations, says Scheuer, can America engage and defeat bin Laden in realistic and definitive terms. As America finds itself mired in the second decade of a multi-front Al Qaeda War bin Laden began during the Clinton administration, Scheuer’s book should be mandatory reading both for anyone curious why this war rages on without seeming end, and for American politicians and generals eager to fight the enemy they have, rather than the one they imagine.
(Note: this review was first written and posted less than a day before bin Laden’s death. Timing is everything.)
In response to Osama bin Laden
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
As has been true the past 500 years, any would-be power monger’s bedside table unadorned with a copy of this slim treatise is shamefully naked.
In response to The Prince
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
That author Raymond Khoury is an excellent storyteller is no surprise. He has demonstrated his skills in this regard amply over the course of the three novels he released prior to his latest one, “The Templar Salvation.” What surprises about “The Templar Salvation” is that it’s even better than the immensely enjoyable novel to which it’s a sequel, “The Last Templar.”
“The Templar Salvation” mesmerizes for a variety of reasons, but it’s difficult to list any of them above the intricate historical, geographical, and sociocultural research he weaves together to create the vivid settings where his characters toil. Khoury is masterful at imbibing his story with richness of time and place both ancient and modern, inviting all his readers’ senses to experience the ceaseless action and twisting plot right along with the characters.
“The Templar Salvation” also treats readers to Khoury’s magnificent pacing. He puts readers in the rare and enviable position of requiring gargantuan effort to stop turning the pages before the novel’s end.
Khoury’s writing is frequently and favorably associated with the best work of the estimable Dan Brown and Steve Berry. “The Templar Salvation” lands Khoury squarely among the ranks of today’s preeminent thriller authors, and calls to mind the writing of Lee Child, Vince Flynn, and David Baldacci.
In response to The Templar Salvation
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
The title of Stephen Haycox’ book is slightly misleading, as the first half of the work details imperial Russia’s “discovery,” exploration and exploitation of Alaska before selling the massive territory to America in 1867 for $7.2 million (about two cents an acre). The book is a brief and interesting primer on Alaskan history from the middle of the 18th century to the dawn of the 21st. Haycox concentrates on sociocultural conflicts between natives and incomers; interminable discord between environmentalists and industrialists; and since statehood in 1959, strife between competing native, state, and federal sovereignty claims over land and resources. Particularly in the first half of the book, Haycox occasionally obsesses with minutia better left to a lengthier examination. Nonetheless, this is a good and well-written introduction to Alaskan history, including an ample bibliography for readers interested in learning more about America’s “Last Frontier.
In response to Alaska, An American Colony
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Editor Peter Haining does a good job choosing the selections for this collection of ghost stories. Rather than emphasizing pieces featuring moaning phantoms, clanking chains and other staple but simplistic fare common to the genre, Haining sought stories heavy with eerie mood and tone. As with any anthology like this one, some vignettes are better or more effective than others. That said, the overall quality of the selections is consistently high. Some of the tales surely will curdle a reader’s blood late in the dead of a stormy night. The compilation makes clear ghosts are as often specters within us as without, and there can be no haunting absent the haunted.
In response to The Mammoth Book of Modern Ghost Stories, Great Supernatural Tales of the Twentieth Century
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
It’s easy to shrug off this novel as a funny book about the most famous and influential rock band of all time. Look deeper. You’ll see scribe Alan Goldsher veils stunning truth behind humorous fiction in his tome, “Paul Is Undead.”
Were three of the Beatles really zombies? Before shaking your head no, examine the connection between the band and author Edgar Allan Poe. In his immortal 1967 song “I Am the Walrus,” John Lennon cries out, “Man you should have seen them kicking Edgar Allan Poe.” Less renowned but no less pertinent is Paul McCartney’s shout-out to Poe in his 1968 song unreleased by the Beatles, “Thingumybob.” This tune’s title is a blatant reference to Poe’s “The Literary Life of Thingum Bob, Esq.” Combine these unassailable facts with Poe’s most famous tale, “The Fall of the House of Usher,” noted as “the basis of zombie mythology in modern pop culture” (see [...]), and one conclusion alone raises its rotting head: Goldsher is dancing around shrouded truths, not beguiling lies. In the Beatles-Poe nexus, Poe was the legendary “Fifth Beatle” who ushered the band in all things zombie.
Still unconvinced the Beatles were zombies? Find a vinyl copy of the band’s 1966 album “Revolver.” Play the song “She Said She Said” forwards on a standard turntable at precisely 33 and 1/3 RPM, and confession emerges clear as day to the astute listener: “I know what it’s like to be dead.” Kudos to Goldsher for venturing where no Beatleologist before him dared.
That said, no way Ringo’s a ninja. That’s just silly.
In response to Paul Is Undead
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Wilkie Collins’ “The Moonstone,” an epistolary mystery story published in 1868, often is cited as one of the first, if not the first, detective novels ever written. No less a literary luminary than T.S. Eliot attributed to Collins the “invention” of the detective novel genre. “The Moonstone” is certainly an excellent mystery story, featuring what would become staples of classic Western detective fiction — an amateur detective, a renown professional investigator, incompetent policemen, multiple false leads and red herrings, and an “inside job.” It’s also subtly laced with social commentary about class, race, sexuality, religious evangelism and substance abuse in Victorian England during a period when the British Empire ruled about a quarter of the world’s population. For anyone interested in the genesis and evolution of the modern socially conscious detective novel, “The Moonstone” is impossible to ignore.
In response to The Moonstone: a Romance, Easyread Comfort Edition
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
On Amazon alone as of today, there are more than 2,900 reviews of Dan Brown’s latest novel, “The Lost Symbol,” so there’s little need for another one covering the book’s entirety. Brown has written better books, and worse. Overall this one is an entertaining but uneven diversion with a fairly preachy exhortation at its end.
The most compelling element in “The Lost Symbol” is the antagonist Mal’akh. I’ve read all Brown’s novels, and consistently have found the vast majority of the characters populating them uniformly flat and two-dimensional. Not so with Mal’akh. (In modern Hebrew, mal’akh is the general word for “angel.”) Brown does a great job endowing this character with dimension, depth, pain, and even a touch of pathos. Of all the characters Brown has created for his novels, Mal’akh is by far the most interesting; more interesting even, dare I say, than the redoubtable Robert Langdon himself.
In response to The Lost Symbol: Special Illustrated Edition, A Novel
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
For purposes of his workmanlike study of the impact of so-called alternative spiritualism on American society over the past two hundred odd years, author Mitch Horowitz defines American occultism as an enterprise embracing a multitude of “mystical philosophies and mythical lore, particularly the belief in an `unseen world’ whose forces act upon us and through us.” In Horowitz’ view, American (as opposed to European) occultism largely has been a crusade for personal self-improvement and beneficent individual empowerment through the good offices of self-anointed seers and dead but altruistic ancestors. He traces the development of this alleged movement from the arrival in New York of a British Shaker named Mother Ann Lee in 1774, through the New Age beliefs and practices popularized during the 1960′s and reverberating to the present day. Horowitz’ argument hinges on his self-serving definition of what he deems a particularly American brand of occultism that is both scatter-shot in its inclusion of virtually any feel-good unorthodox pietism and generally rigid in its exclusion of the more sinister bypasses on the American esoteric highway. It’s an intriguing and informative read, but the subject Horowitz surveys is far more intricately nuanced than his book concedes.
In response to Occult America, The Secret History of How Mysticism Shaped Our Nation
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Author Brad Meltzer’s effort to wrench a thriller from interpolating the Biblical tale of Cain and Abel with the death of the father of Superman’s creator is strained, at best. The story plods slowly, stuffed with highly unlikely coincidences in an attempt to justify the plot’s unsatisfying resolution. It’s rendered jagged by too much clumsy dialogue, a gaggle of flat and unnecessary stock characters, a painfully obvious villain, and constant switches in narrative mode from first to third person for no readily apparent reason. The premise of this inept novel is interesting, and in spots Meltzer writes with breezy ease and commendable fluidity, though far from frequently enough to raise this book to the level of his better work.
In response to The Book of Lies
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Some of Raymond Khoury’s engaging thriller, “The Sign,” focus attention on Khoury’s alleged attacks on certain political and/or religious beliefs they assume he belittles. I see the novel as something other and more abstract than mere vilification of George W. Bush, religion, or global warming skeptics.
“The Sign” examines the power of iconography and symbology in a conflicted world teeming with deeply held and seemingly irreconcilable political, bureaucratic, religious and sociocultural ideologies. The thematic battle in the story is only superficially between one set of believers and another. Rather, the true battle over the sign in the sky is within the reader. All of us respond to various symbols one way or another, more often than not in a Pavlovian manner inculcated in us since birth by self-interested forces far beyond our control. “The Sign” encourages us to scrutinize the origins and mythoi underpinning each icon, symbol and sign we encounter. It urges us to contemplate how, by whom, and to what end such powerful images are used all around us, every day.
Khoury’s message in “The Sign” is important and thought-provoking, and it’s presented in a story well told. Khoury is adept at bringing settings exotic or ordinary to life. The action is crisp and clean, as befits an author skilled at screenwriting. The dialogue rings true, in that it reads the way people actually talk to one another. The characters are intriguingly duplicitous, realistically flawed, and struggle to varying degrees to contain or exploit their own and each others’ rapacities.
It’s a very good book. I had fun reading it and thinking about it, and I recommend it.
In response to The Sign
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Set largely in and around Los Angeles in 1969 and 1970, and told in the form of a psychedelic (as opposed to noir) detective story, plot is far from the point of Thomas Pynchon’s novel, “Inherent Vice.” The plot is disjointed, but then so were the times during which the story unfolds. Rather, the novel presents a pastiche of a post-Altamont and Manson-obsessed slice of America, when the hippie culture was quickly self-destructing, shortly to be eclipsed by Watergate, disco and polyester. Pynchon does a superb job capturing and conveying that milieu through a wide array of distinctive characters who pop in and out of the story, each presenting through their respective mannerisms in speech, conduct, dress and philosophy a unique perspective on the unkept promises of the so-called Age of Aquarius. The book’s title is a legal term referring to a thing that has inextricably in its very nature a covert flaw that renders the thing’s deterioration inevitable. In this novel, the thing in question is the heyday of the American hippie. As Pynchon was there to witness the fall, his work provides a meaningful vista of a particularly American time and place not so very long ago.
In response to Inherent Vice
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Like the waters of Key Biscayne, in and near where much of the plot of this book occurs, this story is choppy. That’s to be expected, given the novel consists of 13 chapters, no two written by the same author. Dave Barry kicks off the story, Carl Hiaasen finishes it, and the writers in between are all seasoned Floridian authors of varying renown. Some of the chapters are funnier than others, some better written, and a couple don’t work at all. The approach makes for disjointed storytelling at best, and reads more like a series of tenuously interconnected vignettes than an actual story. It’s an interesting writing experiment, but one that’s been done before and better. If you’re a fan of any of these authors or the peculiar inanities of south Florida life, you’ll enjoy this book.
In response to Naked came the manatee, a novel
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
I enjoyed Khoury’s first novel, “The Last Templar.” Khoury’s considerable screenwriting talents drove the plot, making the story play like a movie inside my head as I read it. As he has mentioned in numerous interviews, Khoury originally created “The Last Templar” as a screenplay, and the book was accordingly cinematic from beginning to end.
Good as “Templar” is, Khoury’s second novel, “The Sanctuary,” is far richer. In “Sanctuary” we find Khoury maturing as a true novelist, rather than a screenwriter. The characters in “Sanctuary” are not created for the screen, but for the page. They are deeper, more nuanced, and most interestingly, more flawed than the ones in “Templar.” The “Sanctuary” characters are as multifaceted, and at times as unpredictable, as Beirut, the fascinating city in which much of the story occurs. Beirut itself, a city where what one feels is often incongruent with what one sees, is as much a character as the people Khoury propels through the enthralling action in “Sanctuary.” The city mirrors the characters’ individual struggles to balance hope and despair, joy and terror, survival and destruction.
The most compelling aspect of the novel is its theme, urging us to assess not only the benefits, but the consequences and responsibilities of living lives much longer than those afforded us by current actuarial tables. The novel wisely suggests our instinctive desire for materially extended lifespans be contemplated with as much focus on the qualitative as on the quantitative. It may not be so axiomatic whoever breathes longest, breathes best.
“The Sanctuary” is a very entertaining novel, by a very astute novelist. It’s the best novel I’ve read this year (2007). I recommend it highly.
In response to The Sanctuary
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
The lengthy title and subtitle of Arthur Goldwag’s book, “Cults, Conspiracies, and Secret Societies: The Straight Scoop on Freemasons, The Illuminati, Skull and Bones, Black Helicopters, The New World Order, and many, many more,” belies the brevity with which he addresses most of the myriad subjects between the book’s covers. It’s true even a mildly avid researcher can find on the Internet or in a public library or well-stocked bookstore vast amounts of exhaustively detailed material devoted to each of the subjects Goldwag surveys in his book. This is the advantage, rather than disadvantage, of Goldwag’s approach. Goldwag’s book supplies only the tantalizing breadcrumbs. He leaves it for the reader to follow the trail if she’s hungry to find more information on the matters that interest her, many of which she may never had known of before exploring Goldwag’s work. Goldwag’s writing is savvy, crisp and clean, often tongue-in-cheek, and he’s not afraid to voice his personal opinion on some of the wackier Cults, Conspiracies, and Secret Societies featured in his book. It’s a quick, informative and entertaining read, which I believe is exactly what the author intended.
In response to Cults, Conspiracies, and Secret Societies, The Straight Scoop on Freemasons, the Illuminati, Skull and Bones, Black Helicopters, the New World Order, and Many, Many More
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Austin Camacho’s book, Successfully Marketing Your Novel in the 21st Century, is a crucial reference for any novelist seeking a firm grasp of fundamental principles and techniques necessary to get and keep his or her work in the public eye. The 22 chapters in Camacho’s book provide sensible and practical guidance for both the nascent and the more experienced novelist. The book covers a wide array of subjects, including everything from physical (and electronic) book production and distribution to creating memorable marketing materials on and off the Internet to the importance of exploiting “nontraditional” promotional and sales opportunities. It’s a highly informative book, fun to read and think about, and it’s written with warmth, wit and charm. I recommend it strongly.
In response to Successfully Marketing Your Novel in the 21st Century
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
David Gibbins’ novel, The Tiger Warrior, reveals the author is an intelligent, educated and worldly man. The novel brims with historical and archaeological facts and theories spanning in time and place from the birth of the unified Chinese empire in 221 BCE to Caesarean Rome to British colonial rule on the Indian subcontinent to present day Afghanistan. Most of these facts and hypotheses are intriguing, and all are patently the result of Gibbins’ commendably deep research, study and thought.
Unfortunately, none of the above renders Gibbins a master of character, dialogue, or narrative pacing in the art of storytelling. With rare exceptions, his characters are uniformly dull. These characters do not converse with each other so much as they lecture at one another. They often speak for hundreds of words at a time in single stultifying paragraphs that frequently fill more than an entire page before being subjected to an equally bloviated and professorial response. Real people do not talk this way, and wading through lecture after lecture churned out by one flat character after another makes for tedious reading and slows the story to a crawl.
Had Gibbins paid as much attention to character and dialogue as he did to his excellent research, this book would be enjoyable, rather than merely informative. He did not, and accordingly the novel reads far more like a textbook than a good story told well.
In response to The Tiger Warrior
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
This book is a passably entertaining foray into steampunk and a good way to while away a few hours. The principal characters, Maurice Newbury and Victoria Hobbes, are shamelessly modeled on Arthur Conan Doyle’s iconic Holmes and Watson, and they’re even more blatantly reminiscent of the X Files’ Mulder and Scully. The plot moves quickly as the heroes grapple under unreliable gaslight with an array of zombies, robots, and human miscreants in Victorian London at the seemingly incessantly foggy dawn of the 20th century. The story is engaging enough, and often summons compelling imagery. To his credit, author George Mann does a fairly good job bringing most of the handful of main characters to life.
The book cries for the touch of a voracious editor. Mann spends too much energy hammering home via overwrought symbolism the dehumanizing socioeconomic upheavals foisted on England as inevitable end products of Britain’s rampant imperialism and industrialization. There are a couple of insubstantial subplots adding little but extra pages to the story. I suspect Mann included them to introduce characters for future novels. Mann has problems with points of view, switching haphazardly from one to another. Toward the story’s end Newbury battles in quick succession a pair of zombies, then a pair of robots, then a serial killer on the roof of a train, and finally in a zeppelin against the evil mastermind, defeating them all with a brand of superheroism that reduces the likes of James Bond to effete incompetence. The last couple of chapters, and the epilogue, exist solely to ensure the reader knows all too well Mann has every intention of writing the further adventures of Newbury and Hobbes. With strong editing, those adventures may well be worth reading.
In response to The Affinity Bridge
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Cats are said to have nine lives because they’re popularly purported to be more tenacious of life than most animals. Dan Baum titled his excellent book “Nine Lives” both because it details the pre- and post-Katrina true stories of nine very disparate New Orleanians, and as a tribute to a city that clings to life with feline tenacity despite powerful forces continually arrayed against its survival. In the face of impending if not inevitable disasters repeatedly flung at the city by nature or man, the people of New Orleans refuse to let their city die. This is a very good thing, as New Orleans is the only major American city where the philosophy of “laissez faire” refers not merely to economic liberalism, but to a way of life riveted to joys other than those that can be measured most readily in minutes and money.
Baum writes well and clearly, in a succinct and fairly journalistic style. The nine people he chooses to follow before and after Katrina are interesting, and in recounting their stories they reveal as much about the kaleidoscopic city they love as they do their tragedies and triumphs in it. Baum’s storytelling technique can get a bit choppy as he intersperses the nine stories together over 40 years, switching from one to another. After the first few chapters I chose to read the book by character, rather than in order of pagination.
Baum’s book Nine Lives is enlightening, entertaining, and moving. It’s a stirring epistle to and from a great American city and its people. I recommend it.
In response to Nine lives, death and life in New Orleans
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
I enjoyed this book very much. The story is well-paced, the plot twists and turns engagingly, and the characters are sufficiently motivated to propel the action to its conclusion. I appreciated how Khoury allowed the two principal characters to examine their religious and spiritual beliefs during the course of the story, questioning and scrutinizing their respective belief structures. That the belief system in question in “The Last Templar” is Christianity generally, and Roman Catholicism specifically, I found irrelevant. The characters’ scrutinization of their attitudes towards faith applies as well to any faith-based belief structure, whether religious, sociocultural, or political. The story urges reflection about any belief unquestioningly accepted or rejected.
Regardless of its philosophical underpinnings, it’s a great story, brimming with action and suspense, set in a variety of exotic locales, and it’s a lot of fun to read. I understand it’s being developed as a miniseries. If the producers and directors do it justice, it will be a lot of fun to watch, too.
In response to The Last Templar
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Although those old enough to remember the 1986 World Series may feel differently, many deem the September collapse of the 2011 Boston Red Sox as the worst flop in the history of Major League Baseball. As recently as August of 2011, smart money in Las Vegas put the chances of the Red Sox making the post-season at 99.4%. The Red Sox proved Vegas wrong by utterly blowing the nine game lead the team enjoyed in the American League Wild Card race in early September. Tony Francona fell on his sword and stepped down as Red Sox manager a couple days after the season’s disastrous end, emphasizing among other ailments that derailed the team’s seemingly assured playoff appearance a locker room teeming with strife and dissension among the players. But author Glenn Stout’s excellent new book, “Fenway 1912,” gives the lie to the notion that locker room ego clashes preclude championship play on the diamond.
As intimated by its subtitle, Stout’s book covers far more than player discord during the 1912 season. Fenway’s inaugural season was marked by virtually incessant tumult — terrible weather; greedy baseball executives; labor unrest; professional gamblers; Boston politics; architectural slapdash; ornery fans and religious intolerance. Each and all of these demanded heavy tolls from the team during a baseball season book-ended by the Titanic’s sinking and an attempted assassination of Progressive Party presidential candidate (and former president) Theodore Roosevelt. Given that virtually anyone who personally witnessed Fenway’s erection and its first World Series isn’t alive anymore, Stout does a superb job sifting through masses of contemporaneous historical records to unveil not only the intricacies of building the park and the team that played in it, but also to imbue the book with a sense of the turbulent social, cultural, political and economic forces roiling America 100 years ago. In that way, “Fenway 1912″ appeals more broadly than to only fans of the Boston Red Sox, or of professional baseball. Stout conveys very well a small slice of Americana at a time when the country was undergoing fundamental sociopolitical changes culminated by Woodrow Wilson’s winning a ferocious four-party presidential election while the tinder of World War I caught fire in the Balkans.
Before spring training’s first pitch the 2011 Red Sox were widely considered a lock to make the post-season, if not win the World Series. Presumably the October 11, 2011 release date for “Fenway 1912″ was intended to coincide with the team’s predicted march to championship glory. It would be a shame if the team’s premature demise dowsed interest in Stout’s outstanding new book. The 1912 Boston Red Sox were a team ridden with religious and other schisms so intractable bloody fistfights broke out in their locker room during the World Series they won. Against this backdrop, Stout’s book is instructive in making abundantly (though unintentionally) clear that pinning the 2011 team’s failure on a vastly pettier brand of interpersonal friction than what rocked Fenway throughout 1912 rings hollow. Good history is illuminative that way.
In response to Fenway 1912, The Birth of a Ballpark, a Championship Season, and Fenway’s Remarkable First Year’
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
There’s nothing particularly subtle or intricate about J. Gregory Smith’s competent new novel, “A Noble Cause.” It’s a straightforward modern thriller, unburdened by complexity. With the exception of one secondary character, all of the principals and secondaries who toil in Smith’s story are either plainly good, or plainly bad, and none of them are very deep. Smith’s settings won’t take readers anywhere they’ve not visited before courtesy of dozens of other novelists in scores of other novels. Still, Smith writes fairly snappy and realistic dialogue, his points of view are consistent, and he paces this novel well enough to keep the pages turning. It’s a solid thriller, written with skill sufficient to hold readers’ attention and keep them entertained.
In the aftermath of his girlfriend’s Antiguan disappearance and the murders of his parents in Pennsylvania, Mark Noble battles to uncover the reasons and people behind the mysterious kidnapping and deaths. The plot rushes along a track centered around clandestine mind control experiments conducted on unwitting subjects via pharmaceutically-enhanced hypnosis. Accordingly, the back-cover copy of Smith’s book likens “A Noble Cause” to Richard Condon’s famous 1959 novel, “The Manchurian Candidate.” In that the latter was as much socio-political Cold War commentary as thriller, while Smith’s work has no such grand political or philosophical ambitions, the comparison is at best a stretch. Nonetheless, “A Noble cause” is a rewarding read, and a good way to while away a few hours.
In response to A Noble Cause
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Few cities’ annals fascinate the way the long, colorful history of New Orleans does. While there’s no shortage of books old or recent detailing New Orleans’ twisting, twisted chronicles over the past three centuries, readers interested in the city’s eerier side will find much to delight in author Troy Taylor’s brief but entertaining book, “Haunted New Orleans.” Over the course of 12 chapters in less than 130 pages, Taylor tells some of New Orleans’ most famous and infamous ghost stories, and he tells them well. A lot of this material is available in greater detail in other books, but to his credit Taylor does a fine job of introducing tales that for countless years have made the flesh of both the city’s residents and its visitors shiver. “Haunted New Orleans” is a solid, informative and often spine-tingling primer for people intrigued by the macabre things that rise up to crawl and creep when sunlight surrenders to nightfall in The Big Easy.
In response to Haunted New Orleans: History & Hauntings of the Crescent City
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
I’ve navigated thousands of streets in scores of cities round the world, only rarely stopping to ponder much how those street names have to say about their cities’ stories, whether glorious or sordid. Nowadays many of us traverse modern cities cut into neat blocks by roads efficiently but boringly designated chiefly by numbers and letters, or states and presidents. (As in, “I’ll meet you at the corner of 32nd and U, not Virginia and Jefferson.”) Especially for those people, John Chases’ book “Frenchmen, Desire, Good Children” will make you wish your city elders had the good sense to christen such tepidly named streets instead in honor of the famous or infamous folks who first founded your cities back when the roads weren’t more than well-trod ruts in the dirt. Chase’s book unveils the long and twisted history of New Orleans by revealing how its streets came to bear the names they do. For anyone who has wandered the serpentine thoroughfares and alleyways of New Orleans, or who wonders what forgotten tales the more singular street names of their own cities may tell, “Frenchmen, Desire, Good Children” is an enlightening and very entertaining read.
In response to Frenchmen, Desire, Good Children– and other streets of New Orleans
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Can something as mundane as a hand accidentally slammed in a car door derail an eminent United States senator’s promising presidential prospects? In Alan Glynn’s new international thriller, “Bloodland,” it might do so just as readily as the mysterious helicopter crash off Ireland’s coast years earlier that killed a coked-up young Hollywood trollop at the peak of her notoriety. Without a steady job in hand or on the horizon, young journalist Jimmy Gilroy reluctantly finds himself freelancing on spec to write a biography of the famously dead starlet. The vapid celebrity expose he dreads writing becomes something vastly more dreadful as finds himself delving into a savage conspiracy that sucks him into an increasingly menacing labyrinth of lies and corpses reaching from the depths of war torn African jungles to the steps of the White House.
Though it takes a little while to get off the ground, Glynn’s novel is a worthy read for conspiracy thriller fans. The Great Recession’s rapacious specters loom in the book’s background as Glynn deftly weaves spiraling plot lines teeming with twisted characters, all of whom are intriguingly flawed and none of whom are particularly loveable. The dialogue is crisp, and thanks to Glynn’s fastidious research the settings ring both exotic and true. As with many of the best modern thrillers, a real-life story chillingly similar to the tale Glynn spins in “Bloodland” could be the breathless headlines on tomorrow’s news.
In response to Bloodland, A Novel
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
Most novelists with robust sales in their rear view mirror stick rigidly to the tried-and-true format that earned them their past successes. In the highly competitive arena that is modern fiction book publishing there’s nothing inherently wrong with a writer clinging tightly to formula, particularly when that formula has resonated with readers and the people cutting his royalty checks. It happens all the time. So it’s both noteworthy and laudable when an author with Raymond Khoury’s estimable track record not only probes a new path, but does it with a result as satisfying and enjoyable as his new thriller, “The Devil’s Elixir.”
Khoury burst onto international bestseller lists in 2006 with his blockbuster novel, “The Last Templar.” “The Last Templar” and the three books that followed it have been translated into dozens of languages, and have charted in scores of countries. If any bestselling novelist could rest on his stylistic laurels and adhere to formula, it’s Khoury. Kudos to him for choosing instead to present something a little different in his latest release. For the legions of ardent fans of Reilly and Tess there are no worries, because the engaging duo are back in “The Devil’s Elixir.” However, in this breakneck thriller the whirlwind plot (excepting the prologue) unfolds entirely in the present day, as opposed to interweaving with a historical adventure as in Khoury’s previous works. And while Khoury’s prose gets better and more engaging with every book, with this release admirably continuing that trend, for the first time in any of his novels Khoury elected to write a large part of the book in (Reilly’s) first-person narrative. Given his prior triumphs, Khoury certainly didn’t have to craft the book that way. That he did speaks well for him spreading his wings as a writer, and also enhances the immediacy and impact of the story for readers. Yet while exploring narrative techniques unprecedented in his earlier books, Khoury still delivers what his fans have rightfully come to expect — a gripping plot with astonishing twists, consistently alluring protagonists, and a really nasty villain who earns his menacing epithet, El Brujo (“The Sorcerer”), many times over during the novel’s course.
This is Khoury’s best book to date. It will please his steadfast fans, and it will gain him many new ones.
In response to The Devil’s Elixir
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
As our economy continues to wheeze slowly along (what we hope is) its road to recovery in The Great Recession’s tumultuous aftermath, James Grippando has written a new thriller that gives pause to conventional thought about what laid beneath one of the most brutal financial crimes of recent times. The story’s starting point is clearly inspired by Bernie Madoff’s felonious scam that’s commonly considered the biggest financial fraud in American history. In the stand-alone book “Need You Now,” however, it doesn’t take Grippando long to veer sharply from Madoffian dogma and offer for consideration that motivations other than pedestrian self-enrichment can underpin swindles like Madoff’s.
In the enthralling style for which Grippando has become very popular, “Need You Now” tells the story of Patrick Lloyd. Lloyd is a young financial advisor who, with his enigmatic girlfriend Lilly Scanlon, risk all to expose a deadly $60 billion ponzi conspiracy that oozes from Wall Street’s gleaming skyscrapers to sleek, shiny Singapore, to dangerous Paraguayan no-man’s-land, and far into the dark heart of Washington, D.C. Appropriately enough given the deliberate complexity of financial chicanery like Madoff’s that spans both many years and great distances, this is no elementary A to B to C linear mystery tale. Instead, Grippando successfully intertwines a labyrinth of intriguing (and sometimes seemingly incongruous) plot lines to create a story that’s immediate and timely, and as disturbing as it is engrossing. His protagonists are sympathetic and very human characters, refreshingly unlike the quasi-superhumans who frequently overpopulate modern thrillers. Grippando also does a great job of evoking a true sense of place for his settings. For example, in addition to aptly setting stages around various Manhattan hallmarks that are well known from scads of other books set in New York, he deftly captures and conveys less renown places like the Lemon Ice King of Corona, and “spaghetti park,” in Queens. That kind of care for detail is emblematic of all Grippando’s work in “Need You Now,” and is only one of many reasons this very enjoyable thriller is well worth reading.
In response to Need You Now
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
After reading “Living Proof,” it’s clear debut author Kira Peikoff has no fear of jumping into controversy. Peikoff’s book is a well-written and compelling thriller that boldly examines some of the most contentious medical, legal and philosophical issues confronting us today. Arianna Drake, a brilliant young doctor specializing in infertility treatment, runs a clinic that attracts unwanted and potentially catastrophic scrutiny from the U.S. Department of Embryo Preservation. Trent Rowe, the DEP agent tasked to gather evidence sufficient to shut down Drake’s clinic and end her career with imprisonment, instead finds himself allured by Drake despite her past radicalism, and the illness that threatens to take her life very soon. The more Rowe learns about Drake’s life and her illegal but miraculous work, the less sure he is of things he took for granted before meeting her. With lives and an unprecedented medical breakthrough on the line, Drake and Rowe find themselves racing time and facing danger, ruin and death against the backdrop of one of today’s prevalent sociocultural conflicts. The story’s set 15 years from now, but Peikoff’s plot could spring from fiction to fact far sooner than that.
In response to Living Proof
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
I travel often, and one of the best ways I’ve found to get a quick survey of a city new to me is to read up on its local ghost stories. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a “believer” or not in ghostly things — a town’s popular ghost stories reveal much about the place and its people, and how they came to be the way they are when you finally get to meet them. In “Haunted Savannah,” author (and Savannah tour guide) John Caskey has assembled an enlightening and very entertaining collection of Savannah lore. The dozens of stories in this book provide a brief but fascinating overview of Savannah’s nearly 300 years of singular history. In keeping with its title, the vast majority of the stories are of the ghost variety, but the book also features several tales of local strangeness arising from plain eccentric behavior rather than other-worldliness. The book’s final few pages give thumbnail descriptions of each of Savannah’s famous 24 city Squares. The book would benefit greatly from some copyediting, but it serves well as a useful and fun introduction to a captivating American city.
In response to Haunted Savannah, the official guidebook to Savannah haunted history tour conducted by Cobblestone Tours, Inc
Richard Gazala posted on March 27, 2012
“Three Stations” is author Martin Cruz Smith’s latest installment featuring Russian prosecutorial investigator Arkady Renko, though it’s not the greatest. That honor remains firmly in the grip of Smith’s exceptional 1981 thriller “Gorky Park,” which first introduced Renko to the literary world. “Three Stations” is the seventh novel in the Renko series. Smith wasn’t quite 40 years old when “Gorky Park” came out, and the Soviet Union still had a decade of life left in it. Smith was nearly nearly 70 when “Three Stations” was published in 2010, by which time the Soviet Union that Smith and Renko grew up with had been dead and gone for almost 20 years.
Or had it? As he has with all the novels in his Renko series, Smith artfully imbues the stories and the characters that fill them with a certain brand of uniquely vodka-drenched Russian discontent and world-weariness that has thrived unabated for generations. It’s clear Smith and Renko see Russia’s current sociopolitical and economic oligarchical hierarchy as fundamentally far more the same than different from its Soviet and Tsarist predecessors in all but name.
The plot in “Three Stations” is straightforward, anchored to a rural teenage prostitute named Maya’s frantic search for her stolen baby in the bleak and dangerous Moscow neighborhood from which the novel takes its name, while Renko tracks a serial killer of young women. The book directs at least as much focus on Maya’s travails as on Renko’s, which has disappointed some of this book’s reviewers. That said, it’s clear the principal character in “Three Stations” isn’t Maya, or even Renko, so much as it is present-day Moscow. Viewed from that perspective, “Three Stations” is a very good book; Smith’s eye for detail and his talent for unveiling the crushing and seemingly insurmountable disparities between Moscow’s privileged elite and downtrodden masses are no less sharp than they were in “Gorky Park.” Smith’s deft touch with dialogue, in particular, is just as brilliant as it has ever been in succinctly conveying modern Muscovites’ daily tribulations. Moscow is a massive city of 11.5 million people that lately finds itself drowning in cash wrenched as much via the country’s deeply imbedded corruption and criminality as from rampant exploitation of Russia’s vast natural resources. The brutish effects of that money’s savagely inequitable distribution inflame the novel’s every page. Russia is a very old country, and whether ruled by Tsar, Secretary General, or President, Smith’s premise is that Russia’s internal monologue has stayed remarkably unchanged in many ways for many centuries.
Though it’s not hard to tell both author and character have grown somewhat tired in the past 30 years, nevertheless they’ve done so gracefully. Fans of Smith and Renko, and those who find modern Russia fascinating, will appreciate “Three Stations” as a knowledgeable thriller author’s newest postcard from an unvarnished Moscow.
In response to Three Stations, An Arkady Renko Novel
Lorine Kritzer Pergament posted on March 24, 2012
P&P is in my neighborhood. Our move to DC coincided with P&P’s opening in 1984, and it has been a mainstay in my life. My book club is registered, thus giving us a nice 20% discount, and I’ve enjoyed numerous hours browsing in the store and eating or grabbing a coffee in the coffee shop, alone and with friends.
In response to inStore: Politics and Prose, a DC Institution
Mandy posted on March 17, 2012
I’m loving the boards by Tattered Cover Book Store in Denver, CO. http://pinterest.com/tatteredcover/
In response to Tech Tip: Is Pinterest for Book Lovers?
Jada Bradley posted on March 12, 2012
Interesting. I like that you included the detail about the “Mrs. Clooney” shirt. That makes me think of how Bridget Jones is crazy about Colin Firth in the book and he appears playing a character in the movie.
In response to Page to Screen: The Descendants
Meg @ A Bookish Affair posted on March 12, 2012
I love Pinterest. I have a designated board for bookish things and my future library!
In response to Tech Tip: Is Pinterest for Book Lovers?
Jim Carney posted on March 9, 2012
My daughter loves your books and passes them on to me. I believe we have read all of them.
If you are ever in Chicago we would love to have you for dinner. You would have to do most of the talking. Telling us all the interesting things about your life.
I hope my daughter reads your new book quickly.
Best regards.
In response to Whatcha Reading, Downton Abbey?
Paul Beyfuss posted on March 9, 2012
Lots of good information about the journey to be published and the story seems like a good read
In response to inSelf-Publishing: Carla Danziger
Fred Greenhalgh posted on March 6, 2012
Thanks for the attention to online audio drama! It’s really quite phenomenal how the medium is reviving thanks to the internet. Readers may be thrilled to know there is a wealth of resources out there, over 200 hours of free downloads for all contemporary material is available through podcasts like Radio Drama Revival http://www.radiodramarevival.com and the Sonic Society http://sonicsociety.org/ which showcase new work each week. A lot of phenomenal “indie” audio drama awaits your ears!
- Fred
In response to Tech Tip: Radio Theater is Making a Comeback
Adama posted on March 5, 2012
What disturbs me is that The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels is dilcuned as the 100 Classic books pre-loaded (at least by Chapters/Indigo in Canada.). Communism has killed at least 130 million people so far. 10% of all Canadians are refugees from Communism or the descendents of refugees from Communism. Tell the Chapters / Indigo bookstore monopoly you are not interested in buying mandatory Communism with your e-book reader!
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: E-Readers and the International Market
Christian posted on March 5, 2012
Thanks, Smog and Teen. Encyclopedia Dramatica is good at encapsulating my enflieg of anxiety about the internet. I remember reading an article about Anonymous in Rolling Stone or something a few years ago and actually being more confused by it. Favorite quotes: Truly Epic Lulz, Like an internet hate machine
In response to Ethnic & International Lit in the Internet Age
Baseball Fan posted on March 5, 2012
Excellent review, with good conclusion. The front office just isn’t as thrilling as a Home Run!
In response to Page to Screen: Moneyball
All posted on March 5, 2012
I am glad I borrowed this book from the libarry instead of paying $ to buy it. We have a merchant store on Amazon for 4 years. This book has not told me anything that I didn’t know. I finished the book in 3 hours, granted I skimmed through a lot of it because I already knew the stuff. But it sounds more like an advertising for Amazon as it keeps talking about these sucessful Amazon sellers. Well, I wonder how many of them actually compete head on with Amazon. They talked about a seller saying that it is not a problem competing with Amazon and don’t think Amazon will drive them out of business. But they don’t tell you the truth!! If Amazon gets into a product, they get the buy box almost 95% of the time even if they are not the lowest price seller. Then of course the book didn’t talk about how ruthless Amazon is in driving out competition, that they will match the lowest price of any seller (may be except for the book category) before shipping, instead of the overall price. We have in our experience seen Amazon sell an item cheaper than wholesale cost, and we called the supplier and verified that the price they sell to Amazon is indeed higher than what Amazon is selling at. In other words, Amazon is the 10,000 lb gorilla that will squash the competition even by losing money on the sale because Amazon can afford to. Therefore, if you are a new seller and want to get into selling on Amazon as a business, don’t let this book fool you thinking that it is easy as long as you have great customer services. It also don’t tell you that A-Z guarantee is always on the side of buyer no matter what form of confirmation you have. All in all, this book is for someone with no experience selling on Amazon at all. The only thing I found useful was just some tips on marketing.
In response to inTouch: Amazon Reviews Used to Channel Rage about Jerry Sandusky
Damir posted on March 5, 2012
Amazon has a tremendous meinatrkg operation based on excellent service and a valuable service: reader reviews. Oh, there is the occasional inaccurate review, but Amazon reviewers are rabid about letting a potential buyer know the real story. I look for a lot of stars, but I read very carefully the lower star reviews. This gives me tremendous confidence when I plunk down my hard earned money on a book or a product. Not sure if e-books get reviewed the same way.AstroGremlin recently posted..
In response to Conversation of the Week: Amazon, For Better or for Worse?
Yulia posted on March 4, 2012
I wonder what Mr./Dr. Thompson would have to say about Will Smith… Probably that Independence Day wasn’t onvleit enough and waaaay too Establishment.(Glad you grabbed the poster from our site. Come on back anytime.)
In response to The Rum Diary – Where’s Raoul Duke?
Alex posted on March 4, 2012
He’s just 25 years old, but Beat Magazine in Melbourne has already ellbaed Tommy ‘The Future of Funny’. Labelled has a double- `L’. Change your spell checker settings.
In response to Maps and Legends: Tom Wolfe
Hamzah posted on March 4, 2012
When I was in my early teens I would read 6 books a week. I remember this as that was the muaimxm the library would allow us, and I would go to the library every week.I don’t keep tabs of how many books per year I read now, although after reading your post I may do that. I read mostly in bed as I struggle to fall asleep without winding down first. My life is so hectic that the half an hour at the end of day to read is bliss. I did used to read in my lunchbreak, but am studying a distance learning journalism course now so my lunchtimes are spent in the library studying journalism modules.Being able to commute to work would be a good time to schedule some reading time. I spend 10 hours a week in the car travelling to and from work oohh what I could do with that extra time instead of listening to Radio 1!!
In response to National Book Foundation Announces its 5 Under 35 Authors
Atilla posted on March 4, 2012
, I think we actually agree more than we dseigrae, we’re just taking different meanings of inspiration. Inspiration of the amen variety is great. There is nothing wrong with bringing that kind of inspiration forth into art. I loooooove Haydn and Bach and they were definitely very inspired people. Inspiration of the rent is due so I’m gonna put my feces in a mason jar and sell it as Art, that’s bad. I think we pretty much agree there. What I was more getting at with my earlier comment is that once one has a book deal with a deadline, it’s good to be able to turn it out under pressure, inspired or not.On the other hand, your last paragraph is the very opposite of what I believe. But that’s ok too.
In response to Lost Among Words: Inspiration
Jason posted on March 4, 2012
Sounds like great advice! I puaticalrrly like the idea of getting some reviews available before the general public’ is invited. Did you find that 1 day was enough? Making sure the reviews are honest makes a lot of sense too I expect most of my beta testers for my first app will be friends, I’ll make sure they know that I really do want them to be fair in their review. Thanks! Bookmarked for planning our launch!
In response to There’s An App for That: The War of 1812
Anna posted on March 4, 2012
I live on a teeny tiny island and there are 3 drfiefent bookstores on here and I think they are all independent except for maybe 1. I’m not sure because this store also has three others in South Florida its called Books and Books. The other two though have been here for as long as I can remember and were always each others competitions. The only really problem I have with all the bookstores here though is the limited selection on manga/graphic novels. Maybe manga doesn’t have a big market here but I would love to finally find a store here with a wide manga selection instead of having to go to a big chain store to stock up when I go away on vacation.
In response to inStore: Politics and Prose, a DC Institution
Stu Hall posted on February 23, 2012
I read it and thought it was *okay*. Fast read. If you don’t mind me linking, I reviewed it on my blog.
http://stuhallwrites.com/2012/02/23/book-review-the-ten-make-that-nine-habits/
In response to Will You Read: The Ten, Make that Nine, Habits of Very Organized People. Make That Ten. by Steve Martin?
Cathy Kawalek posted on February 23, 2012
And did you notice that Thomas sadly referred to his hand as ‘Jules Verne’ experiment? I see Thomas reading Jules Verne and focusing on the dark side!
In response to Whatcha Reading, Downton Abbey?
ellen posted on February 21, 2012
Could this be the Downton equivalent of “The Help” ?
In response to Below Stairs, The Classic Kitchen Maid’s Memoir That Inspired “Upstairs, Downstairs” and “Downton Abbey”
Dr Bob posted on February 16, 2012
although Madonna portrays a sexy image, it is her intelligence that is most attractive
In response to The Art of the Intellectual Crush
Elaine Nagle posted on February 14, 2012
All of the Downton ladies “upstairs and downstairs” are reading Maisie Dobbs! And I trust they will be passing the books on to the curious gentlemen in their lives.
I fully expect to see The Maisie Dobbs series on PBS in the not-too-distant future.
Thank you, Jacqueline Winspear, for reaching out to your readers and keeping up timely connections!!
In response to Whatcha Reading, Downton Abbey?
Bob Beyfuss posted on February 13, 2012
I think Tina Fey is among the hottest women in Show Biz, but only when she wears her glasses and says intelligent things.
In response to The Art of the Intellectual Crush
Delilah posted on February 13, 2012
Jeff Goldbloom… He has aged very well.
In response to The Art of the Intellectual Crush
Vic posted on February 13, 2012
Awesome!
In response to The Art of the Intellectual Crush
Julie Jelks posted on February 10, 2012
More PLEASE really good book.
Thank you,
Julie
In response to inAuthors: Scott Poulson-Bryant Riffs on Going from Music Journalist to Novelist
Diane Lobaugh posted on February 9, 2012
J. Have you ever considered contacting the BBC about “doing” your Maisie Dobbs series?!!!! They do period drama well and your stories are very interesting. D.
In response to Whatcha Reading, Downton Abbey?
Jacqueline Winspear posted on February 9, 2012
Regarding whether “downstairs” staff could read – most certainly they could. Though most would have left school at twelve years of age, even the most lowly child would have had a solid grounding in the “three R’s.” Discipline was at a high level, and though there are always exceptions (truancy), those exceptions remain today. To illustrate this, check out this recent article (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2087605/Fannie-Bryans-magical-century-old-exercise-book-humbling-lesson-todays-schools.html) – the exercise book belonging to a nine-year old gamekeeper’s daughter was found recently, and sheds light upon the levels of accomplishment attained by children in the last century. My grandmother was of that generation – left school at 12, if not before – and she read five or six books each week throughout her life – this despite losing the sight of one eye in a munitions factory accident in the Great War. The library was her favorite place.
In response to Whatcha Reading, Downton Abbey?
Georgene Moizuk Bramlage posted on February 8, 2012
Very interesting and well-researched article. One question, however. How many of the “downstairs” staff might have been able to read? Was there universal primary education available in the UK during this time period?
In response to Whatcha Reading, Downton Abbey?
Kathie posted on February 7, 2012
Anna is reading all the Dracott Abbey Series books..
In response to Whatcha Reading, Downton Abbey?
Betsy posted on February 7, 2012
For different reasons, I can see Rudyard Kipling’s books on several nightstands at Downton.
In response to Whatcha Reading, Downton Abbey?
KENN JOUBERT posted on February 7, 2012
Very nice work of research, my favourite author!
I loved your listing. My wife and I follow all the stuff on PBS stations. The other one for us is Knowledge in BC Canada. I thoroughly enjoy the Historic shows – right in my alley. I also think the famous poetry of Service – from the Klondyke gold rush time at Dawson city. “the cremation of Sam McGee”. and I always remember my mother, a lady brought up as a “Young social lady” standing before us reciting “There is a Green-eyed yellow idolteo the north of Catmandoo, there’s a broken hearted woman in the town, etc” – spoken very dramatically.
I always buy my daughter a copy of your new books (except I read them first”.
A writing fan. Kenn
In response to Whatcha Reading, Downton Abbey?
Paula Marshall posted on February 7, 2012
Anna, Lady Mary’s maid would be reading Agatha CHristie or any other good Murder Mystery she could get her hands on. Bless her.
Agree with others, can’t wait for “Eddie”
In response to Whatcha Reading, Downton Abbey?
Sheila Lawrence posted on February 7, 2012
I agree that Anna would have loved all of your Maisie Dobbs books. I have read all of them and I am waiting for Elegy for Eddie.
In response to Whatcha Reading, Downton Abbey?
inReads posted on February 7, 2012
Thank you, Lillian! Please use the buttons above to share by email, Facebook, or Twitter. We share your desire for everyone to see it!
In response to inBlogs: Maisie Dobbs, Inspiration from an Extraordinary Generation
Mary Castillo posted on February 7, 2012
I imagine that Anna would’ve loved the Maisie Dobbs series!
In response to Whatcha Reading, Downton Abbey?
inReads posted on February 7, 2012
Love it…great catch, Cathy!
In response to Whatcha Reading, Downton Abbey?
lillian sharp posted on February 7, 2012
I wish you would have a place to forward these newsletters. i want EVERYONE to see them . LOVE your books and this Downon Abbey nightstand list. cute.
In response to inBlogs: Maisie Dobbs, Inspiration from an Extraordinary Generation
Cathy Kawalek posted on February 7, 2012
Early in the series Lady Grantham mentions that the relationship amongst her daughters is not ‘Little Women’ so we know that she read Alcott!
In response to Whatcha Reading, Downton Abbey?
Daniel Beyfuss posted on February 6, 2012
Having been a friend of Dr. Ray for quite a few years now, I can honestly say he is a maniac and a fiend. He’s also a very good writer. You should read his work.
In response to inSelf-Publishing: Pill-Billies by Dr. Jacob K. Ray
jeckson posted on January 30, 2012
None of this is going to happen of course. Even so, I do wish people would break away, as much as possible, from reading only the season’s most obvious writers and books. Be brave. Buy a collection of poems every so often, explore genre fiction and the midlist, go back to that classic you always meant to try again, study the important books on the subjects that interest you. Above all, just say no to the insidious dominion of the best seller.”
In response to inTouch: Limit the Bestseller List?
Katy Eller posted on January 9, 2012
John Bartlett of Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations did not attend college. He did eventually own the University Bookstore at Harvard!
In response to infoGraphics: Famous Authors and the Colleges They Left
Karen Freund posted on January 7, 2012
Will be sad to tell my 94 yr old mother that Lillian Braun has gone. She was an avid reader of the cat who series and for two years after 60 whiskers,she would inquire every day–”have you heard anything about the book;is Lillian well and writing again? I am sad too. What an amazing
person she must have been. Such a great talent and imagination. Not likely to be forgotten.
In response to inTribute: Lillian Jackson Braun, the Author Who…
Anders Lowell posted on December 31, 2011
Oh my soul for the return of the beatniks, and let me return to the curse of lono once again to giggle senselessly at the antics of this great legend
Was just listening to a recording of The Book Report by Elaine Charles, wherein Thompson’s collection is discussed. Definitely a must have for a collector.
In response to inSide Books: Fear and Loathing at Rolling Stone by Hunter S. Thompson
LoriJoseph posted on December 29, 2011
Mid-Life – compounded by relocation away from family and friends, loss of job, black balled and empty nest, I am there. I have found great satisfaction writing poetry and prose. Never having written before, I find it amazing that within 9 months I’ve completed a manuscript. My professors
and friends encouraged me to do so. As a mother, it was if I have given birth all over again, to myself. Currently in the infancy stage, yearning hugs and kisses to help me grow.
In response to inAuthors: Meredith Mileti Riffs on The Novel as Mid-Life Crisis
Hirohito Protagonist Wannabe posted on December 29, 2011
(DON’T SELL MY EMAIL OR I’LL ENGAGE YOU IN A SWORDFIGHT AND HACK YOUR HEAD OFF!) I read this book and before I read it, I thought that Douglas Adams was the only person who could write a science fiction novel that was even remotely funny. The dry humor in this book and the programming culture and the Metaverse…it hit the spot. It’s now my favorite book, actually. I’m an incessant reader of science fiction, so I was hoping you could point me in the direction of more funny books like Stephenson’s that have hacker/programmer references integrated into the plot (heck, the plot is made for hackers!). Thanks! Best book ever!
In response to Cult Beat: Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson
LeeAnne posted on December 29, 2011
I’ve seen the Godfather movie, and have read the book. Personally, I preferred the book. It could be because I saw the movie about 20 years after it was made, and it just seemed dated. All of the famous lines were cliche by then, and I had seen hundreds of impressions of Marlon Brando. I read the book just a couple of years ago, and enjoyed it quite a bit. My favorite story line in the book is about young Don Corleone. This made up the story line of Godfather II, which I really liked. But I still liked the book better.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Is the Movie EVER Better than the Book?
Cecilia posted on December 15, 2011
Information new to me about WWII and the women who worked in the Resistance in France.
In response to A Train in Winter
Amanda posted on December 12, 2011
As Kindle becomes more popular I find it harder and harder to jump on board. I love the feeling of holding a book and turning the pages.. marking the tops with tiny folds when I need to save my page. I spend 10+ hours in front of a computer screen and countless playing with my cell phone and it’s just a nice break from technology to pick up a book.
In response to The Best of inReads: Tech Tip
Thane posted on December 1, 2011
I would encourage one and all to follow the instructions on lilicomputing to sideload golauncher, homecapture, and the Amazon market and streaming apps onto your nook tablet. Add a sd card for additional memory and you have a great tablet with access to tons of content, including all of Amazon’s streaming media (that can also be downloaded for viewing when you are off WiFi).
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: The Nook Tablet
Bob posted on December 1, 2011
I think the Kobo’s got better than long odds to establish themselves. Amazon has really messed up with the Fire’s international aspect: even Apple gets that, with the iPad immediately useful in international markets.
The Kobo dominates its home country (Canada), and because it isn’t dependent on the US to develop its marketplace and concept, it can transport itself to the UK and the EU much more easily.
Amazon might want to hire a few extra lawyers for its copyright clearance team, if it is smart.
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: E-Readers and the International Market
Sharon M. posted on November 30, 2011
We know there is “nothing new under the sun”, but we seem to have truly lost our ability to creatively use what is there.
In response to inTouch: Are We Out of Titles….Or Are We Out of Ideas?
Joe posted on November 29, 2011
The only black friday shopping I do is online. Safer, sleep-friendly and sometimes better deals.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Black (and blue) Friday vs. Cyber Monday
Amanda posted on November 29, 2011
I did do some shopping on Friday afternoon without much success because if you weren’t there at 2am then you were out of luck. Then yesterday morning I bought a TV online for a better price than the one I went out to buy on Friday! With all of that being said I went out last night to Walmart (which was in total shambles) and was told by an employee that a fight broke out between a man and an older women. Why would anyone want to miss a fight over a waffle iron that ended in him punching her in the face. With all of this being said I was almost sad that I could miss such in-store chaos.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Black (and blue) Friday vs. Cyber Monday
Brooke posted on November 29, 2011
I feel that the stress of the holidays would only be exaggerated by dying while trying to obtain gifts for my loved ones…not to mention the added obligation of paying for a funeral during a fiscally difficult time of year. That aside, Black Friday is heavily marketed as the busiest shopping day of the year, but in actuality, it isn’t…only the most animalistic.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Black (and blue) Friday vs. Cyber Monday
Carl74 posted on November 29, 2011
never got into anything personally, but i saw a young mother hip check a guy in toys r’ us for some doll.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Black (and blue) Friday vs. Cyber Monday
Annie posted on November 26, 2011
I absolutely loved this book! For the first time, time travel makes some sense without some kind of crafty expedient. Excellent historical research: I’ve checked all that concerns Oswald, his associates, etc. and it’s quite accurate. An excellent thriller, Stephen King’s style, based on historical facts. I highly recommend it!
In response to Will You Read: 11/22/63 by Stephen King?
Gia Manry posted on November 22, 2011
I’ve also noticed that a few of Amazon’s latest Kindle Daily Deals have been for books from its imprints…which appear to also be available for Prime members to borrow for free. Interesting times, these!
In response to Tech Tip: A Roundup
Jon posted on November 22, 2011
Nice! Wanted to include him.
In response to infoGraphics: Famous Authors and the Colleges They Left
Wendy posted on November 22, 2011
Edgar Allan Poe – University of Virginia
In response to infoGraphics: Famous Authors and the Colleges They Left
Jada Bradley posted on November 22, 2011
Gia-You could read while using a treadmill…but I prefer a more relaxed method of reading myself.
In response to inTouch: Reading Fiction is Good for You. It’s a Scientific Fact.
Brandon posted on November 22, 2011
Definitely John Irving
Replace Anthony Bourdain with Julia Child (She seems more kindly and warm than Bourdain. He scares me.)
Tennesee Williams (Just to have someone at the table called Tennesee)
Harper Lee. Just because.
And Brooke Beyfuss-Powell. Because I want to live.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Top Five Authors I’d Invite to Thanksgiving Dinner
black friday kindle fire posted on November 22, 2011
We do enjoy reading your article that is useful for every people in this town.
In response to inTouch: The Kindle, Unplugged
Paul posted on November 21, 2011
Garrison Keller, The Daly Lama John Updike ( yes I know but dead guys are okay ) Rod Sterling.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Top Five Authors I’d Invite to Thanksgiving Dinner
Brooke posted on November 21, 2011
On it!
In response to Conversation of the Week: Top Five Authors I’d Invite to Thanksgiving Dinner
Daniel Beyfuss posted on November 21, 2011
I’d like a pumpkin pie.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Top Five Authors I’d Invite to Thanksgiving Dinner
Brooke posted on November 21, 2011
Ha! I love it! And yes, one-fifth of your wishlist shall definitely come true so name yer pie.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Top Five Authors I’d Invite to Thanksgiving Dinner
Amanda posted on November 21, 2011
I would vote to have Charlaine Harris at my dinner table. It would start out as an innocent meal and then out of the blue there would be vampires, fairies and werewolves flying into the topic of conversation. Who wouldn’t love that?
In response to Conversation of the Week: Top Five Authors I’d Invite to Thanksgiving Dinner
Gia Manry posted on November 19, 2011
Not just young ones! I’m so excited for this movie
(Still kinda wish they’d cast Hailee Steinfeld though.)
In response to Conversation of the Week: Young Fiction Fans Gear Up for The Hunger Games Movie
Gia Manry posted on November 19, 2011
Cool! Now just find me a way to lose weight while reading
In response to inTouch: Reading Fiction is Good for You. It’s a Scientific Fact.
Dale Copps posted on November 17, 2011
Amazon probably has as much legal right to lend books which it purchases as any library or, for that matter, any individual has, thanks to the First-Sale Doctrine. This law (17 U.S.C. Section 109) allows a purchaser to lend, sell, or give away a copyrighted work without seeking anyone’s permission once it has been obtained (Wikipedia–First-Sale Doctrine).
Of course, if two of its Prime customers want the same book at the same time, Amazon must purchase two copies, or be guilty of copyright infringement. This, on certain titles, Amazon seems ready to do. And unless Amazon has specifically (and foolishly) signed away that legal right with certain publishers, I see no reason why they can’t do the same with any title.
More worrisome, from the author’s point of view, are “the vast majority [of titles]” (Amazon officer quoted in the Wall Street Journal) for which Amazon is paying publishers a flat fee, reportedly on an annual basis. How are author royalties being computed in these instances?
Most worrisome, however, is the uncertain fate awaiting the institution of the public library should Amazon or some other commercial entity assemble a comprehensive, reasonably priced eBook lending service for an eReading public now starved for content. At present, neither public libraries via Overdrive, the Open Library movement, nor Amazon’s rather risibly limited Kindle Owner’s Lending Library comes close to satisfying that need.
I address this question at some length on my blog at:
http://alltogethernow.org/showtag.php?currid=85
In response to inTouch: Amazon’s New Kindle Lending Program Under Scrutiny
alan holdgate posted on November 17, 2011
Brilliant fast paced book keeps you in the story till you turn the last page.
a must for any reader
I loved all the characters
Best wishes
alan
In response to The Blue Zone
K.Nicole posted on November 16, 2011
Loved this interview with one of my favorite authors. I have all of her books.
In response to Author Tananarive Due Talks Horror, Civil Rights, and Immortals
Jon posted on November 16, 2011
Thanks. Glad you enjoyed them.
In response to infoGraphics: Some Bad NaNoWriMo Book Ideas
Cindy martin posted on November 16, 2011
I really like your history of the latte! Figures Americans messed it up with too much milk. Anyway, I once wrote a little poem in the back section of Java House in Iowa City. I think I was drinking a latte too because I remember the way they decorated the foam with a coffee swirl. If I lived near Java House, I would write a great novel there, but sadly I was only visiting. Since there are no cool cafes in the icky MI town where I currently live, that novel will have to wait.
In response to inAuthors: Eric Olsen Riffs on Not Writing in Restaurants
David posted on November 14, 2011
Ha! I used to have Bart Simpson’s Guide To Life. I lost it. Serves me right seeing as I borrowed(stole)it from someone.
In response to inTouch: TV Characters are Keepin’ it Real…with Fake Books
Jady posted on November 14, 2011
I much prefer ifnomraivte articles like this to that high brow literature.
In response to inTouch: Was JFK’s Speechwriter Really His Ghostwriter?
Meg @ A Bookish Affair posted on November 14, 2011
LOL! These are very funny!
In response to infoGraphics: Some Bad NaNoWriMo Book Ideas
Blondie posted on November 14, 2011
I’m impressed by your writing. Are you a profesisnaol or just very knowledgeable?
In response to Amanda Knox and the Media – All the Media
Morten posted on November 12, 2011
Posted another interview with Jennifer Egan on my blog: http://ratemybooks.com/2011/in-focus-jennifer-egan/ Hope you like it!
In response to inVideos: Jennifer Egan Talks E-Readers and Writing by Hand
Bryce Wilson posted on November 11, 2011
Oh man I know what you mean with the dangers of funny books while driving. The one that nearly did me in was Bill Bryson’s A Walk In The Woods.
Bill Bryson’s delivery of the line “My you sure do like Pancakes” while impersonating an obese waitress flirting with his obese friend Katz, had me crying laughing from the beginning to the end of a three mile road.
In response to inTouch: Reading Dangerously: What Books Make You React Aloud?
Dick Cummins posted on November 11, 2011
Opps – this is not the blog that was offering a free book to be selected by their dog for comments.
It was ‘Writerhead’ which is one blog post removed backwards from here! Duh… can’t keep track of things at this age and Eric is on an eclectic virtual book tour … dc
In response to inAuthors: Eric Olsen Riffs on Not Writing in Restaurants
Bryce Wilson posted on November 11, 2011
The new lending library thing.
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: Amazon’s Member$ Only Digital Library
Drew posted on November 11, 2011
Catch-22 made me laugh out loud when I first read it. One of only maybe three books I’ve had that visible a reaction to.
In response to inTouch: Reading Dangerously: What Books Make You React Aloud?
dick cummins class of ’70 posted on November 10, 2011
I don’t write in restaurants because it can be too distracting … as in – “Couples play out scenes in restaurants,” you mentioned Mamet writes.
This is a ‘couples’ restaurant story I know from McGraw-Hill’s Textbook Division, Midtown Rock Center that happened in the late ’60′s.
Early 40-something editor George asks advice of Spanish acquisitions consultant for the Advertising list …
“Hey Emile – my wife found out about Ivana in steno and I have to break it off. She’s so emotional in bed I think there could be trouble. Got any ideas for me?”
“Sure. Take her to the Chez Montparnasse for lunch. Wall to wall CEO’s, Wall Street lawyers and their paramours! So intimidating you’ll be safe – can’t fail!”
Around 3:00 pm the next day I see George talking to Emile in his office. He has his head in his hands.
“It was all crystal and class all right. After the wine and sole I told her we couldn’t see each other anymore because Audrey found her sexy note in my pocket – and – well, you know, I have to consider my kids and all that.”
“Did she understand? Everything under control?”
“Not exactly. She stood up so fast her chair fell over backward and everybody turned to stare.”
‘So this is why you didn’t take me to Chock Full a Nuts then?” she shouted. “And why do you think I care if we’re through? Listen Georgie boy,” she hissed. “All you ever wanted to do was fuck, fuck, fuck — and you know what? YOU WEREN’T EVEN VERY GOOD AT THAT!’
I’d never met Ivana then but I really wanted to and I bet Hemingway would have liked to have written about her too – but the scene would have had to have been in a sidewalk cafe in Paris of course and she have to say ‘screw’ the times not having changed.
Eric – I think you’re right about writing in a coffee shop or cafe, people in restaurants can make it hard to concentrate.
Your friend, dick cummins, class of ’70
P.S Daniel – if the dog picks my name, send me the free book as even though I have a collectors’ copy already signed by several of the perpetrators, ‘We Wanted to Be Writers’ will make a good gift to my class of ’70 failed writer friends — and after all, the Holidays are just around the corner.
In response to inAuthors: Eric Olsen Riffs on Not Writing in Restaurants
Gia Manry posted on November 10, 2011
I feel like this article needs a mention of “Princess Bride”- a book which was presented as the “abridged” version of a longer work by S. Morganstern…which didn’t exist, of course. I know more than one person who wound up looking for the “original Morganstern version” of Princess Bride!
Okay, it’s not TV, but it’s still kinda cool
In response to inTouch: TV Characters are Keepin’ it Real…with Fake Books
Gia Manry posted on November 10, 2011
I got a Prime membership for the shipping, so everything else is pretty much gravy for me…but are we talking about access to library books, or are we talking about the new lending library thing?
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: Amazon’s Member$ Only Digital Library
Pati Nagle posted on November 10, 2011
I just recently read War and Peace for the first time – on my Kindle. So nice not to have to hold a brick in my lap.
Ereaders open up flexibility on length – in all directions. Short fiction is also doing well in ebook form. People who don’t have a lot of time and don’t want to spend a lot to try a new author can get a short story for $.99 or so.
In response to inTouch: Saying So Long to Short Books
Jon posted on November 9, 2011
Does Stephen Colbert’s “I Am America and You Can Too” count?
In response to inTouch: TV Characters are Keepin’ it Real…with Fake Books
Cathryn Mullen posted on November 9, 2011
I have writen in varying cafes voer the last few months, and I’ve found soem places more conducive than others. sadly the only stand alone coffee shop by my house seems to suck the life from my writing. I’ll be traying the Library this week. And, as crazy as it might sound, I might try the grocery store I shop at weekly. They have a cofee shop and bakery (even ready made sandwiches and susi) and a very nice, blocked off from the rest of the store, with a gas fireplace, eating and lounging area. I nee to scope out the outlet placement though I’m often never away long enough to run out of juice if I plan things properly.
:} Cathryn
In response to inAuthors: Eric Olsen Riffs on Not Writing in Restaurants
Bryce Wilson posted on November 8, 2011
I think I can safely say that they’d be pretty far up your alley Gia.
In response to Cult Beat: Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson
Dale Copps posted on November 8, 2011
The End of Libraries, Parts I, II, and II
http://alltogethernow.org/showtag.php?currid=85
In response to Tech Tip: Need to Know for Kindle Lending
Gia Manry posted on November 8, 2011
I’ve wanted to check these out but just haven’t gotten to it. Guess I’ll add ‘em to the list!
In response to Cult Beat: Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson
David posted on November 7, 2011
I for one am definitely less conscious of the length of what I’m reading on an e-reader – which is mostly a good thing. I may miss the sense of accomplishment upon finishing a huge book.
Good point about density.
In response to inTouch: Saying So Long to Short Books
Johnee posted on November 7, 2011
Walking Dead is by far THE best comic book adaption ever done on television by far. My jaw dropped after the first few episodes because it was so well done. When I first heard that it was being made into a series I thought OK this would be great on HBO… IF they did it right. When I found out it was going to be on AMC I was ‘no! no! no! no!’ Boy, was I wrong! They managed to put everything that is needed into the series without worrying about censorship.
Hey I know I’m gushing about this series but c’mon, some episodes are even better than the source material ( the Godfather syndrome ) and that’s rare.
Your comment about the show capturing the “flavor” of the original is an understatement. This is a very faithful adaption that completely captures the concept and themes of the comic. The Zombies are almost incidental. The series is mainly about how Rick and the other humans survive this plague, and most importantly… how they survive each other.
As far as other fanboys wanting an exact panel by panel narrative. Well let’s just say that these are the kind of people that complained about Hugh Jackman’s excellent Wolverine from the first two X-men movies because his claws didn’t pop out further down from the back of his hands! I’m sorry, but several of the main characters are very faithful to their comic book couterparts. Rick is the moral man who always tries to do the right thing in spite of tough decisions, and Shane… well let’s just say that the decision to keep Shane around was a great idea, and he is actually a much better and more complex character than he is in the comics.
In response to The Walking Dead: Adaptation Gone Rogue
Matt C posted on November 7, 2011
What a lame cop out from Gia. I find that cycling between eating institutions and libraries and home keeps me fresh enough to want to write more. And then I get online and comment on posts about writing to make myself feel like a writer when I’m not revising the concert review that was supposed to get done today.
In response to inAuthors: Eric Olsen Riffs on Not Writing in Restaurants
Gia Manry posted on November 7, 2011
I try never to write in restaurants…too worried about spilling something on my laptop!
In response to inAuthors: Eric Olsen Riffs on Not Writing in Restaurants
Marcie Lovett posted on November 7, 2011
Jonathan, I think I’m going to post the guide on my bulletin board! I’ve stopped asking for feedback because I wasn’t getting anything meaningful. My favorite is, “You must have worked really hard on it.” Well, yeah.
In response to infoGraphics: What People Are Saying about Your Book and What They Mean
Liz posted on November 7, 2011
LOVE THIS. As an author, I usually assume that when someone says they “loved” my book, unless they mention specific passages that moved them, they skimmed it or simply didn’t read it. Personally, if they bought it, I don’t care, but…
My favorite moment along these lines was when I was at a conference and ran into a professional acquaintance who said,
“Congratulations on your book! Read it, loved it. It was so awesome. Girl, you are too cool.”
I had just turned in the manuscript to my editor and the book wouldn’t be published for another year and two months. Instead, I think this guy saw the Facebook invitation for the party I threw to celebrate the completion of writing my book, and he assumed that it was the book party. I got a laugh out of it, but I also definitely lost respect for him. It’s okay to lie and say you read someone’s book, but make sure it’s been published first.
In response to infoGraphics: What People Are Saying about Your Book and What They Mean
Albin Drzewianowski posted on November 7, 2011
One definite plus with a long book on an e-reader, it is much more comfortable to read. I recently finished Stephen King’s “Under the Dome” which is over 1000 pages and it was hard to get comfortable holding the hard cover book to read. More so now that I have an e-reader to compare it to.
In response to inTouch: Saying So Long to Short Books
Gia Manry posted on November 5, 2011
As a professional writer, this is something I run into a lot, especially when I was job-hunting: everyone thinks that they can write, especially people who do reasonably well speaking/presenting. And don’t let anyone fool you; there ARE some overlapping skills there.
But knowing the language is not the same as expressing it well, and even speaking it well is not the same as being able to write it well. Unfortunately, since everyone thinks they can write, there are two major consequences:
1) A LOT of people apply for writing gigs to earn a little extra income, even if they’re unqualified. Because they’re unqualified they’re willing to work very inexpensively, devaluing the work of professionals.
2) Employers/clients think that they could handle the writing if only they didn’t have so much else to do, so they bring on unpaid interns or pay minimum wage to handle the work on a long-term or ongoing basis, further devaluing the work of professionals.
Now, obviously not everyone does these two things, and I’m not even one to say “never work for free!” or anything like that. I have been very fortunate in procuring employment pretty consistently. However, and particularly in our present age of constant content, I have watched these things go on and it’s really quite odd; as the *demand* for content goes up, the *perceived value* of such content seems to be going down rather than up with it…
In response to Lost Among Words: A Few Tips on Writing? No, Thanks.
kyttyn posted on November 4, 2011
Wow. Just. . . wow. I kinda want to fly up to NY just to be able to personally watch this thing in action. (*mentally adding this to my bucket list. xD)
Is there a fee to use the machine, or is it just free to use?
In response to Taking the Espresso Book Machine for a Test Drive
Gia Manry posted on November 3, 2011
I can’t wait to see what people come up with for books before I die. Not that I don’t love me the peace and quiet of a “plain ol’ book” book, I’ve spent my entire life being amazed by what people come up with as new technology arises.
(I was born in the 80s, just a bit before computers were something everyone had. So I have that handy knack for picking up new tech quickly without being unimpressed about the new stuff
)
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: E-books for Fun and Prophet
Beth Kephart posted on November 2, 2011
How blessed am I to find YAMO here. An angel was at work. I am grateful.
In response to Out Now!: Dystopians, Vampires, and Harry Potter
L. D. Rafey posted on November 2, 2011
I entirely empathize! My big ‘wins’ in H.S. and college were my socio-political essays. I grew weary of this type of writing and wished to spend more time on poetry. I was a great Dylan Thomas and John Updike fan and happened to have had Jessie Stuart as a H.S. English teacher. My reading has spanned virtually everything from Homer to contemporary works (mostly foreign these days). I studied the classics and have read in Latin, Ancient Greek and Chinese literature. I, too, write both prose and poetry and have never been able to decide on which I should be spending more of my time. They both demand about the same focus and time to create. I am consistently at war with myself over this ongoing dilemma. I have more recently (and after many years of essentially hiding my work) published a rather lengthy YA fantasy novel that seemed to naturally lend itself to a poetic-prose narrative and contained enough originality of plot and dynamics to warrent the immense effort. Although I have begun (many times anew) a new and very different type of work, I have been finding myself returning again and again to poetry, which, as you have noted, is not so popular (unless it is ‘hip-hop’ or some such variety of junk poetry). I am addicted to the way language can be used to produce as many moods; to express as many dimensions as possible. If you would be interested in looking at some of my poetry and to exchange viewpoints. I would be pleased (and vise-versa) Otherwise, I certainly wish you all the best.
In response to Lost Among Words: Poetry vs. Prose
Meg @ A Bookish Affair posted on November 1, 2011
I’m so excited to get my hands on 1Q84. I’m a huge Murakami fan!
In response to Out Now!: Dystopians, Vampires, and Harry Potter
swing set rope ladder posted on November 1, 2011
but also because black works well with so many other colors. The color gold shares many of the attributes of yellow.
In response to inTouch: Amazon Wants to be the Literary Netflix?
Bryce Wilson posted on October 31, 2011
This article exceeds the daily recommended amount of greatness. Well done.
In response to Five “Serious” Writers We’d Like to See Do Genre Fiction
Jo-Cat posted on October 31, 2011
I am writing a book on how I went from being born into poverty to retiring at age 46 without hitting the lottery, inheriting a penny, without picking out a home run stock or any other get rich quick scheme. Rather being responsible, frugal, enjoying what’s less costly and free, saving, investing, budgeting, avoidance of debt and taking control of my finances without being brainwashed by a system that tells you when you can retire. The Title is “Don’t Let the System Tell you When” You can see my first year “freedom” pictures on facebook (alternate name: Jo-Cat) of how I am now living MY dream not the system’s dream. You can twitter me @Jocatthekid and you can email me on stopthegreed on yahoo. The book is 75% done and it will be a straight forward, honest, guide on how to retire in your forties so that you can spend your most precious finite resource (time) as you wish. I am considering Amazon above and others as publishers. I welcome publishers and promoters to consider all offers for publications etc. This book is NOT a get rich scheme, it gives step by step instructions on what to do, what not to do, who to trust, who not to trust, myths and disciplines. This will change the lives of those who wish to have more leisure time. My life is the proof that you can retire in your 40s by following my investment ideas, saving discipline, budgeting, and understanding of different asset types from the simplicity of CDs, ETFs, Mutual Funds, Shorts to cover longs, rental property, tax lien certificates, Sovereignty debt, real estate, hard assets, energy, utilization of dividends, currency plays, precious metals, etc… Leveraging and conservative low risk choices is my life story that enabled me to now sleep in late and enjoy a life of leisure. Avoidance of those who care more about profiting from your money than growing it is one key. Investment vehicles such as 401Ks, 403bs, 457b, IRAs, and how to utilize tax law to take equal lifetime expectancy withdraws at an age you decide along with my 3-tier approach to providing income that is efficient to pay the least amount of income tax is covered. It’s not rocket science but it does require you to understand the best asset types and when to buy and sell and what to buy and hold, etc. The “gurus” complicate the uncomplicated to confuse the masses. This is not a work 3 years and retire program rather work within 20 years max and you can easily retire comfortably without pulling in 6 figures a year. Obviously avoid debt that is not an investment and I will give you the first key, buy a home that you can pay off within 15 years max, 10 years better, 5 years and man your going to be watching the weather for leisure instead of your commute to the office. I am excited to set people free. God Bless, Sincerely Jon aka Jo-Cat
In response to DIY: E-Publishing? Easy as 1, 2, 3…4
Daniel Beyfuss posted on October 30, 2011
I agree he played up the image, why wouldn’t he, it was his meal ticket. But he realized the problems it caused. In that same BBC documentary he talks about killing off Duke, saying the image prevented him from covering stories in the way he was initially accustomed to. I’m a big fan of entire Hunter Thomspson mystique, but I’d rather people dig a little deeper and find out exactly who they’re idolizing.
In response to The Rum Diary – Where’s Raoul Duke?
E.A. Mayer posted on October 28, 2011
A “warts and all” portrait of an iconic personality. Worth reading if only for the sections that describe the magic of his showmanship.
In response to Steve Jobs
Bryce Wilson posted on October 27, 2011
Honestly, that’s great to here. Book Culture will always survive. Even if it has to go underground for awhile.
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: E-Readers and the International Market
newsjunkie posted on October 27, 2011
I lived in Italy in the mid 70′S and the Europeans are much more traditionally minded than Americans even to this day. Just walk through London and see how many small books stores there are versus New York and It’s still a big deal about first editions of classic books. So It’s no surprise Amazons Kindle E-readers haven’t been a smash hit there. Asia’s a completely different story. In Japan space is at such a premium you can’t have rooms filled with just books and not people. I would expect the Kindle Fire will become a big hit when it goes on sale there.
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: E-Readers and the International Market
alan holdgate posted on October 27, 2011
This is the best book ever written
In response to The Book Thief
Bryce Wilson posted on October 27, 2011
Some nice insight on The Rum Diaries but as for Thompson’s relationship with Raoul Duke I can’t say I agree a hundred percent with your police work there Lou.
You can accuse Thompson of a lot of stuff, but trying to play down Raoul Duke isn’t one of them. I agree that the persona eventually subsumed him, and in the aftermath of the Thrilla In Manilla it more or less destroyed him as a writer. But frankly that’s as much Thompson’s fault as anyone’s. Watch Fear And Loathing On The Road To Hollywood, the BBC documentary, and you see someone who is deliberately playing into their legend. And that was way back in 1978.
Here’s an interesting excerpt from the introduction to the new collection Fear And Loathing At Rolling Stone by Paul Scalon,
“A few months after the election we were sitting in Jerry’s. Hunter looked like hell and was clearly not in great spirits. For reasons that will ever elude me, I decided to give him a helpful lecture. Retire your alter ego Raoul Duke, I said. Or send him on a long vacation. Go back to being the journalist who wrote Hells Angels. Cut back a little on the drugs and the booze. He turned towards me as he reached into the pocket of his safari jacket. He gave me a look; nothing nasty, just a look. He extracted a tab of Mr. Natural blotter acid from the pocket, stared me in the eye, and swallowed it. I got the message. Our conversation resumed. ”
There was a lot more to Hunter Thompson than a head full of acid. Unfortunately, not all of the time.
In response to The Rum Diary – Where’s Raoul Duke?
Gia Manry posted on October 26, 2011
Great analysis, Jada. This is a topic that really intrigues me…especially as a huge fairy tale fan. I constantly checked out the original Grimm’s from my school library starting in probably third grade, and it’s amazing how twisted they are (and how much more so they used to be).
In response to inRetro: Making Fairy Tales Grown Up (Again)
Gia Manry posted on October 26, 2011
As someone who’s worked in an industry that suffers a great deal due to piracy (Japanese comics/cartoons), I think implementing some criminal punishment for certain forms of piracy is a good idea.
However, to say that a law “wouldn’t” be used to prosecute this, that, or the other thing is just silly. I haven’t read the text of the bill myself, but if it doesn’t explicitly SAY it only applies to people who are making money off of illicit streams, then it doesn’t count! All it would take is one company with a connection to a prosecutor’s office to get that law used in a way other than intended.
Again, I haven’t read the text myself, so maybe it is explicitly stated. But if not…that should probably be fixed!
In response to Conversation of the Week: S.978, Bieber Behind Bars, and Freedom of Expression
Abena posted on October 26, 2011
On one hand: I also giggled when I read this article, and felt an elation that I haven’t felt in weeks. I guess that’s what the possible demise of Justin Bieber does to me. On the other hand: in a larger sense, I’m not shocked. Welcome to American where balance does not exist, where there is only black or white, and the pendulum is at either point of it’s path but never passes through the middle. Copyrighted material does need to be protected, but the process of determining that needs to be a tad less arbitrary.
In response to Conversation of the Week: S.978, Bieber Behind Bars, and Freedom of Expression
Brooke posted on October 26, 2011
I think an important question here is: What can we, as a society, do to ensure that JB gets the maximum allotted sentence?
In response to Conversation of the Week: S.978, Bieber Behind Bars, and Freedom of Expression
Gia Manry posted on October 25, 2011
Just a note– Drops of God is considered a pretty big deal! Gilt Taste called it “the most important wine book” of the moment, and whenever new chapters come out in Japan, the wines it mentions see their sales skyrocket! Pretty cool stuff.
Also, I haven’t read it yet myself, but Vertical does excellent releases so I’m sure the first volume is simply stunning.
In response to Out Now!: Zombies, Wine, and Rescuing Dogs
Alta posted on October 25, 2011
Indeed I have considered a personal computer!
In response to infoGraphic: Your Next Office
Gia Manry posted on October 25, 2011
Hit submit too soon
Seriously, people tend to get nervous when they see all of the rights that sites’ TOS demand, but the reality is that they HAVE to have those rights in order to legally share your content the way *you* specifically want it to, if you want things to carry over to other social media, to notify your friends on that site, etc. It’s all very complicated >_>
In response to inTouch: Cloud of Doubt Hangs Over Social News Site Movie Deal
Gia Manry posted on October 25, 2011
The smart move for Reddit would be to sit back and enjoy the attention. “Sure, Digg, but did any of YOUR comments get made into a major motion picture?”
If they kicked up a fuss about the rights, I expect it would garner some ill-will, as well as making people nervous about contributing to the site.
But does Reddit really retain movie rights in its terms of service? I’d love to see a lawyer look those over to see how much hypothetical leg Reddit would have to stand on. Most of the rights held in a TOS are specifically for using comments for their own promotional purposes, for their appearances on various pages on their own site, for their appearance on other sites (like Facebook or Twitter), etc.
In response to inTouch: Cloud of Doubt Hangs Over Social News Site Movie Deal
Wendy posted on October 25, 2011
He’s a total rock star. The ironic part is that his book The Hours is one where I really wanted to flip back and forth, which is so hard to do in an e-book. Maybe I would have clung to hieroglyphics too…
In response to inVideos: Author Michael Cunningham Talks E-Readers, Computers and Smacking People
Drew posted on October 25, 2011
This guy kind of rules.
In response to inVideos: Author Michael Cunningham Talks E-Readers, Computers and Smacking People
David posted on October 24, 2011
Content rights should be taught in schools.
In response to inTouch: Cloud of Doubt Hangs Over Social News Site Movie Deal
Daniel Beyfuss posted on October 22, 2011
I’d be crying.
In response to Geek Wisdom: 5 Pieces of Wisdom from Our Favorite Nerds
truck bed organizer posted on October 21, 2011
It is a warm color that can be both bright and cheerful as well as somber and traditional.
In response to inTouch: Amazon Wants to be the Literary Netflix?
Brooke posted on October 21, 2011
“If my doctor told me I had only six minutes to live, I wouldn’t brood. I’d type a little faster.”
Too true…it’s easy to forget that we’re ALL dying.
In response to Geek Wisdom: 5 Pieces of Wisdom from Our Favorite Nerds
Linda Rae Blair posted on October 21, 2011
What happened to freedom in this country? Once they passed on her novels, previous OR subsequent, they should have lost any right to limit her putting them wherever she chose! I was shocked at Penquin’s stand on this. I would never even consider doing business with them after hearing about this. My hope is that this will go to court and Keana Davenport can live on a huge settlement for many great years of writing!
In response to inTouch: Amazon E-book Stirs Jealousy and a Writer Loses her Book Contract
Bryce Wilson posted on October 20, 2011
I would just like to point out that the cover for Pigeons From Hell is about as wildly unrepresentative as possible.
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: 4 Free Horror Stories You Need to Read
Dawn Herring posted on October 20, 2011
Christian,
#JournalChat Live is today, 10/20/11, Thursday, at 4 CST/2 PST where we will be discussing this post.
Be refreshed,
Dawn Herring
JournalWriter Freelance
Host of #JournalChat Live and Links Edition
In response to Lost Among Words: Journaling Uncovers the Beauty of Mundane Life
Steven King posted on October 20, 2011
Probably not. Do not enjoy this author’s style.
http://booksatthebeach.blogspot.com
In response to Will You Read: 11/22/63 by Stephen King?
Amanda posted on October 20, 2011
Myracle was very gracious about the whole ordeal. What a giant let down but a classy recovery. That should earn her some brownie points from other readers!
In response to Conversation (Controversy?) of the Week – The 2011 National Book Awards
Daniel Beyfuss posted on October 20, 2011
I honestly never knew it was a comic but I’m not surprised. I’ve seen the show a few times and it was okay, but in my opinion, it’s become a bit annoying when they shoehorn horror into a soap opera type format, or dramatic series, or whatever you want to call it…I don’t know, when it comes to horror I kinda like one-offs.
In response to The Walking Dead: Adaptation Gone Rogue
Gia Manry posted on October 20, 2011
And, according to some, it takes the focus off of a lot of great works that *didn’t* make the list…
In response to Conversation (Controversy?) of the Week – The 2011 National Book Awards
Kama posted on October 19, 2011
I’m a big fan of this show (and I hate, hate, hate gore) and because of it I became aware of the comics. I wasn’t planning to read the comics (at this time anyway) because I just figured it would reveal way to much about the series. I may give it a shot now, or at least I’ll start reading earlier than I had originally planned.
In response to The Walking Dead: Adaptation Gone Rogue
Donna posted on October 19, 2011
I think it is very strange too about the miscommunication. You’d think this would have been in writing including the author names – not just a phone call. It’s all very unfortunate and takes the focus off where it should be – the great works of the finalists.
In response to Conversation (Controversy?) of the Week – The 2011 National Book Awards
Felicia.Pride posted on October 18, 2011
@Peter Straub: The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree! Thanks for the book recommendation with Tietjens Quartet. And all first editions? Impressive.
In response to inVideos: Author Emma Straub Talks Compliments and Assigned Reading
le0pard13 posted on October 18, 2011
Excellent look at this horror lit classic, Bryce. You nailed its essence, alright. Thanks.
In response to Cult Beat: The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
Peter Straub posted on October 18, 2011
Who is this young Emma person, anyhow? She’s dazzling! I some how feel that I even know her! But she’s wrong about one thing in her FM Ford comments — he really was prolific, but many of his books are terrible. However, the Tietjens Quartet is just as good as The Good Soldier. Emma’s father, whom I know personally, has all these books in first editions.
In response to inVideos: Author Emma Straub Talks Compliments and Assigned Reading
Gia Manry posted on October 18, 2011
I keep hearing about The Marriage Plot…I don’t know if I’ll be able to avoid resisting it!
In response to Out Now! Marriage Plots, Wandering Falcons, and Monsters in America
Gia Manry posted on October 18, 2011
I found the whole thing about the mis-announced finalist very odd. Sure, the books rhymed, but who really makes that kind of mistake? That would be really embarrassing!
I tend to be a bit behind on my lit, so all of these are books I haven’t picked up yet. I’m really excited for a few of them though!
In response to Conversation (Controversy?) of the Week – The 2011 National Book Awards
Felicia.Pride posted on October 17, 2011
It’s interesting. I don’t think publishers saw this coming.
In response to inTouch: Friends and Frenemies – Barry Eisler’s Hybrid Deal with Amazon
Christian Harder posted on October 17, 2011
Dear Dawn,
I’m truly sorry that I missed your thoughtful comment when it was originally posted! I’m so busy–as my articles imply–and terrible about keeping up with online stuff.
I could not be more honored by being chosen as your Pick of the Day. I am so sad that I missed the discussion. I will make an extraordinary effort to be there this week.
Thank you again for your kind words. The sort of praise and support you’ve given me here is the greatest reinforcement and encouragement during this particularly busy and difficult time in my life.
If anything, I’ll always be journaling. Thanks again, and I look forward to talking to you soon!
Best,
Christian
In response to Lost Among Words: Journaling Uncovers the Beauty of Mundane Life
Gia Manry posted on October 17, 2011
I just recently saw the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode that addresses this topic (briefly). That episode was from 1997, and I was thinking about how as far as I was aware, not much had changed in these 14 years. I’m glad to see people are still drawing attention to the matter, both Ms. Miré and the people mentioned in the New York Times article.
It’s a tough thing to talk about, which makes such talk all the more important!
In response to inAuthors: Soraya Miré Riffs on Female Genital Mutilation
Sally Dubats posted on October 17, 2011
This is a fascinating article, and I applaud Barry Eisler (and Timothy Ferris). Like me, more and more published authors are going the self-published route. This involves an incredible amount of work above and beyond the writing including creating titles, book covers, content, web presence, social media management, and public relations to name a few. The benefit is that you keep control. It’s a very different ballgame, and I think the more authors that cross over, the more the general public will be aware that there are really great self-published works out there. Thanks, gentlemen, for taking this leap of faith!
In response to inTouch: Friends and Frenemies – Barry Eisler’s Hybrid Deal with Amazon
Bryce Wilson posted on October 17, 2011
That’s good to know, I have to admit I was really taken aback by TDOSM being pushed back. I’m looking forward to reading Woe To Live On myself, as I can’t quite bring myself to pay hundreds of dollars for a paperback.
In response to Why You Should Read Daniel Woodrell
Tony M posted on October 16, 2011
You’ll be happy to know that all of his books are going to be back in print by the spring. Check the Little Brown website. I got to meet Woodrell last week at an appearance in San Francisco and he confirmed it. There is also a film version of The Ones You Do (the third of the Bayou Trilogy) in the works.
I think Woodrell is the best writer in America at the moment. (No qualifying adjective “crime” needed.) I’m not sure The Outlaw Album is the place for newbies to start, since the stories tend to be more “on the nose” and less complex than the novels. I’d point people toward Tomato Red myself. But great blog post calling attention to a great writer.
In response to Why You Should Read Daniel Woodrell
Just starting out? posted on October 16, 2011
“I love my ereader and one of the best things about it is all the free books I have gotten from indie authors just starting out.”
-Mammysfave
How do you “know” if an author is just starting out? And what does “starting out” have to do with the price? Lump all self publishers in the “just starting out” bin and keep them on “free” and 99 cents, or whatever. I know you didn’t say those words exactly but I keep hearing this “just starting out” business again and again.
To the author of this article, yes, I can see clearly now that ADS are the only way writers are going to be able to make money in the digital world. People online don’t want to pay for anything, which is their choice, but ebooks will not thrive on the free. Ebook consumers don’t know, understand, or CARE how much work goes into writing an Ebook. Kindles just came out 3 years ago and the content is already rock-bottom cheap at 99 cents, just in 3 short years. Where do we go from there? 50 cents? 30?
No, the only people who’ll be financially well-off from the Ebook market will be Amazon, Apple, Barnes & Nobles, Google, and possibly Facebook (if they continue to get involved). Writers can forget it. If you don’t believe me, keep watching. My advice to a writer right now would be to get out of ebooks and go into something else that’s NOT related to writing, something that people value, because they certainly don’t value the writing profession.
In response to inTouch: Will Readers Buy the Idea of Ads in E-Books?
Bryce Wilson posted on October 14, 2011
Not to mention that the screen dimensions of most E-Readers are way more suited to Manga than American Comics.
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: The Fate of Comics as We Know Them
Bryce Wilson posted on October 14, 2011
Thanks Brooke. That melancholy is definitely a hallmark of Lindqvist’s work (those Swedes). It’s definitely carrying over to his new book Harbor.
In response to Cult Beat: Handling the Undead by John Ajvide Lindqvist
Brooke posted on October 14, 2011
What a great premise for zombies, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone take this angle! While the fighting/killing zombies is always fun, this sounded heartbreaking from the get-go, definitely worth checking out. I saw the film version of Let Me In and I thought it was very well done, creepy yes, but also terribly sad.
In response to Cult Beat: Handling the Undead by John Ajvide Lindqvist
Beth S posted on October 13, 2011
If the truth was actually told about some of these great figures of history we would never get a day off. We would just be a little more traumatized then we are now. Great article, how englightening.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Columbus – Someone to Celebrate?
Gia Manry posted on October 13, 2011
Wish I could enter!
In response to Contest Time! Win an Audio Book – The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta!
Gia Manry posted on October 13, 2011
As something of a comics reader myself, I’ve been waiting to see more graphic novels on e-readers. Manga (Japanese comics) are starting to get there on iDevices, but the Kindle has been pretty devoid of manga– which, generally being in black-and-white, is so much more feasible on the e-ink Kindles than American comics!
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: The Fate of Comics as We Know Them
Daniel Beyfuss posted on October 12, 2011
I heard a rumor that it was Columbus who invented curse words and practiced uncle abuse. but that’s just a rumor.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Columbus – Someone to Celebrate?
Joe Ronquillo posted on October 12, 2011
I’m convinced…but still require a day off
In response to Conversation of the Week: Columbus – Someone to Celebrate?
Jon posted on October 12, 2011
Great piece. I wonder what Angela Lansbury would have to say about this!
In response to inTouch: The Occupy Wall Street Protest Has Its Own Library
Dawn Herring posted on October 11, 2011
Christian,
Not only was this post beautifully written, I just loved your whole point of view on the journaling process and your experience both past and present.
It is so true that our journal presents our encounter with the world with our own eyes; and our point of view is valuable!
I so appreciate the pleasure the process gives you; I take delight in my a.m. and p.m. journaling. You have so many ideas and approaches to your journal entries. I love how that keeps things fresh and interesting. A Truly Custom approach and experience.
I have chosen your post, Lost Among Words: Journaling Uncovers the Beauty of Mundane Life, as the #JournalChat Pick of the Day for all things journaling on Twitter. I will post a link on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, my blog and website, Refresh with Dawn Herring, and in Refresh Journal: http://refreshwithdawnherring.blogspot.com/.
You’re welcome to join us for #JournalChat Live on Thursdays at 4 CST/2 PST on Twitter; our topic this week on using different journaling techniques.
Thanks again for such an interesting and thought provoking inside view of journaling!
Be refreshed,
Dawn Herring
JournalWriter Freelance
Host of #JournalChat Live and Links Edition on Twitter
In response to Lost Among Words: Journaling Uncovers the Beauty of Mundane Life
Astrid posted on October 11, 2011
Having worked for Population Services International (PSI), I was very excited to read this book and hear Ashley Judd’s accounts of her travels and her work with PSI. I have to say, though, I was a little underwhelmed by her story. I acknowledge that since this book is a memoir, it does require a certain level of self-centeredness on the part of the author. However, I felt there was a little too much focus on her opinions and feelings, and less attention to telling a good story.
In her accounts of her childhood, I felt that Ashley too often portrayed herself as the victim, constantly pointing out how she was mistreated and abused. While I don’t discount the pain and suffering she went through growing up, this constant reminding only made me, as a reader, less sympathetic to her situation. She came across as whiny and repetitive.
Her descriptions of her humanitarian work also left me feeling annoyed. She portrayed the women, men, and children she met as victims, incapable of escaping their horrible plight, thereby stripping them of any sense of empowerment. I felt that her focus on this victimhood contradicted the work of the organization she claimed to represent. PSI, as an organization, is committed to empowering men and women to make healthy choices in their behavior, so I was saddened to read that Ashley Judd, as a board member of PSI, reflected the exact opposite of this philosophy.
This book is by no means a bad read. I found her writing to be eloquent and descriptive, and she shows a great appreciation for the people she meets through her work and her life. For someone like her to use her high-profile status to bring attention to humanitarian issues like HIV/AIDS and sex slavery is honorable, and I wish that more celebrities would take a cue from her and do the same. However, for a good story, I would suggest looking elsewhere.
In response to All That Is Bitter and Sweet, A Memoir
Gia Manry posted on October 11, 2011
Just in time for NaNoWriMo, eh?
In response to Tech Tip: LitReactor – New Online Community for Writers
Gia Manry posted on October 10, 2011
Thanks, Amanda!
It’s a tough debate…I mean, I think of myself as a good person overall, but I’m not sure I would want future generations to judge my actions outside of the context of my society’s values and whatnot, y’know? On the other hand, it’s not like Columbus’s actions went completely without censure even in his own time.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Columbus – Someone to Celebrate?
Amanda posted on October 10, 2011
I’m posting this on my twitter because it’s fantastic!
In response to Conversation of the Week: Columbus – Someone to Celebrate?
Drew posted on October 10, 2011
In high school, we had off for Columbus Day but not MLKJ Day. That struck me as peculiar.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Columbus – Someone to Celebrate?
California posted on October 9, 2011
Moving on up!
In response to infoGraphic: The Literary Totem Pole
Jen Rickard posted on October 7, 2011
You can also read Transtromer’s acceptance speech for the Neustadt Prize online. http://www.ou.edu/worldlit/neustadt/1990-tomas-transtromer.html
I love this quote too: “He has been able to breathe life into the most uninspiring realities of modern existence and in this way has significantly broadened the scope of our poetic vision of the world.” – Jaan Kaplinski, from his 1990 nominating statement for Tranströmer.
In response to Nobel Prize for Literature Winner – Tomas Transtromer
Clint posted on October 7, 2011
It’s weird to catch up on my weekly reads and come across an article like this knowing it was posted just a couple days before his death.
The combination of his resignation, biographies (official and not), the first Jobs-less apple developer’s conference, and his death has made this week incredibly weird but ultimately unforgettable.
Twitter: @cbush57
In response to The Steve Jobs Biography: 3 Things We Want it to Discuss
Linda Morelli posted on October 7, 2011
Great article on Nora, Hope!
In response to Sitting Down with…Nora Roberts
Gia Manry posted on October 7, 2011
I’m right smack at the bottom!
In response to infoGraphic: The Literary Totem Pole
Gia Manry posted on October 7, 2011
I’m fascinated by how steampunk as a fiction movements seems to be really, uh, gaining steam! Next week an anthology (titled, cleverly, “Steampunk!”) is coming out with shorts from a number of authors, such as Cory Doctorow and Elizabeth Knox, as well as some lesser-knowns. I stumbled upon it by accident but am looking forward to it
In response to Scott Westerfeld talks Steampunk, WW1, and Paranormal Romance?
Anne Elizabeth posted on October 7, 2011
Wonderful interview, Hope!!! Very informative and interesting! Cheers!!!
In response to Sitting Down with…Nora Roberts
Jolyse Barnett posted on October 6, 2011
Thanks for interviewing my idol, Hope! I haven’t had the good fortune to meet Nora Roberts yet, but I imagine she’s personable like this interview suggests.
I like her advice to focus on the writing. That’s what I’ll do.
In response to Sitting Down with…Nora Roberts
Daniel Beyfuss posted on October 6, 2011
I guess I’m old because I remember the first computer I ever used was an old Mac with a tiny, black and white monitor. I think our school had three of them. I think I liked using “Paint” the most, but I don’t know if it was called that then.
In response to Steve Jobs: The World Mourns an American Genius
Pj Schott posted on October 6, 2011
What a wonderful interview. I knew nothing about the person behind the books. She is as gracious as her books are incredible.
In response to Sitting Down with…Nora Roberts
Manda Collins posted on October 6, 2011
Great interview, Hope! I didn’t start reading NR until about five years ago, but since then I’ve made up for lost time. Her discipline is inspiring, and though I doubt I’ll ever be as successful as she is, there’s a lot to learn from her.
In response to Sitting Down with…Nora Roberts
Melissa posted on October 6, 2011
Thanks so much for the link to that speech. It’s a great one, very encouraging. The parts about death, though, are pretty sad, in retrospect, but it’s a speech I’m going to save for encouragement in the future.
In response to Steve Jobs: The World Mourns an American Genius
Bryce Wilson posted on October 6, 2011
It seemed appropriate.
I might be wrong but I think Stephenson coined that one as well.
In response to inSide Books: Reamde by Neal Stephenson
Bryce Wilson posted on October 6, 2011
Your choice of words there almost made me spit out some coffee.
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: The New Kindles vs The Nooks
C.H. Admirand posted on October 6, 2011
Thanks for a wonderful interview, Hope!
I am a huge fan of Nora and met her in 1995 at my first NJRW Conference. I’ve been devouring her books ever since.
She is so down-to-earth that she calmed me down when I was getting ready to moderate her workshop at yet another NJRW Conference.
Nora is my hero!
In response to Sitting Down with…Nora Roberts
Felicia.Pride posted on October 6, 2011
All the time, but i do think there is something to be said about strategic breaks to renew or do nothing.
In response to Lost Among Words: When Life Gets in the Way for the Writer
Gia Manry posted on October 6, 2011
I am not a fan of Apple products. I have never bought one myself, and the last time I used an Apple as my primary computer they were still called “Macs” and it had a black and white screen. I find Apple’s management of content a bit scary, to be frank, and was incensed when Steve Jobs claimed to want to “protect” us from porn.
That said, I respect that the man developed tools and technology that I use to immense satisfaction to this day. Had there been no iPod, would my Sansa mp3 player exist? Without the iPhone, would my Android phone be as superb? For whatever faults he may have (and he was human, and he had some), Jobs’ work with Apple has impacted a generation in ways we’ve only just begun to witness, and even the most vitriolic Apple opponent owes him a great deal of respect.
In response to Steve Jobs: The World Mourns an American Genius
Gia Manry posted on October 6, 2011
In concept I actually appreciate that Amazon is attempting to make their readers available at lower prices to those willing to accept the…deformity, if you will.
But in practice, I can’t imagine why anyone would rather have a lifetime of ads in their books than spend another $30-40!
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: The New Kindles vs The Nooks
Drew posted on October 6, 2011
Nice use of meat space.
In response to inSide Books: Reamde by Neal Stephenson
Felicia.Pride posted on October 5, 2011
A book is undoubtedly on the way. The question is how much will publishers pay for it?
In response to Amanda Knox and the Media – All the Media
Bryce Wilson posted on October 5, 2011
I think it will.
Here’s the trailer for those interested:
http://youtu.be/my9Pr-W92SM
Honestly I’m happy about the movie, but I REALLY want This Book Is Full Of Spiders here like yesterday.
In response to Cult Beat: John Dies at the End by David Wong
Gia Manry posted on October 5, 2011
People are certainly fascinated with it, and the media will do its best to turn out as much product relating to it as fast as possible while interest is still high. If Knox herself doesn’t write/ghost-write a book shortly, I expect a few unauthorized biographies or case analyses to come out. In the digital age a publisher can get out an electronic edition fast.
Maybe they’ll even do one of those weird biography comic books, too.
In response to Amanda Knox and the Media – All the Media
Felicia.Pride posted on October 4, 2011
The video is pretty funny.
In response to inSide Books: The Dubious Salvation of Jack V. by Jacques Strauss
William Scott posted on October 4, 2011
I remember last year when I first heard about this book from you on TTDS. It really is an incredible book. I really hope the movie turns out well.
In response to Cult Beat: John Dies at the End by David Wong
Daniel Beyfuss posted on October 4, 2011
yeah, I’m thinking long road trips that’d put you to sleep. put me to sleep anyway.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Audio Books and Celebrity Readers
Gia Manry posted on October 4, 2011
This sounds pretty funny to me. I’ll give it a shot if the opportunity arises!
In response to inSide Books: The Dubious Salvation of Jack V. by Jacques Strauss
Gia Manry posted on October 4, 2011
Awww, Rin Tin Tin! That sounds like a fun read, I’ll have to check it out!
In response to Out Now!: Lives and Legends
Gia Manry posted on October 4, 2011
You know, Daniel, you mentioned Jim Dale and Harry Potter audio books, and I’ve heard they’re good…but I don’t think I could deal with audio books that are quite that long. My favorite audio books were all pretty short.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Audio Books and Celebrity Readers
Jada Bradley posted on October 4, 2011
Shannon– I just started using an electronic calendar last month, so it is good to know that I am not the only one. Oddly enough, I got an e-reader before I went to an electronic calendar. I agree that we will adapt with fewer opportunities to get paper books.
In response to inTouch: Will Paper Books Completely Disappear…Soon?
Daniel Beyfuss posted on October 4, 2011
I think Burt did some kind of survival guide.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Audio Books and Celebrity Readers
Felicia.Pride posted on October 3, 2011
That’s interesting, but I also think that sometimes we don’t necessarily tell the entire truth about our lives, especially when we know it’s going to be printed for the world to read.
In response to The Steve Jobs Biography: 3 Things We Want it to Discuss
Felicia.Pride posted on October 3, 2011
For some reason, I could see Burt Reynolds doing something funny.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Audio Books and Celebrity Readers
Drew posted on October 3, 2011
I think I listened to Lord of the Rings on tape back when. But I’d be interested in listening to Sam Elliott read a western like Warlock or Deadwood.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Audio Books and Celebrity Readers
Daniel Beyfuss posted on October 3, 2011
Yes, David Sedaris, I forgot about him, he’s killer on NPR.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Audio Books and Celebrity Readers
Gia Manry posted on October 3, 2011
(oops, accidentally hit submit early!)
I’ve been meaning to grab the audio book of the second Daily Show book, Earth (The Book).
In response to Conversation of the Week: Audio Books and Celebrity Readers
Gia Manry posted on October 3, 2011
Oh, and the audio book of America: The Book by the Daily Show crew (circa 2004) was fantastic as well. I keep meaning to grab
In response to Conversation of the Week: Audio Books and Celebrity Readers
Gia Manry posted on October 3, 2011
I listen to audio books when I run. Some celebrities work well with a book (let’s face it: Go The F*** To Sleep wouldn’t have been a thing without Sam Jackson); some don’t…it’s never really bothered me either way.
I would say that David Sedaris, who does the readings for his own books, is really fun to listen to. He’s got deadpan down pat!
In response to Conversation of the Week: Audio Books and Celebrity Readers
Shannon posted on October 3, 2011
I tend to steer clear of biographies because no one can tell the story of your life better than you can.
I just recently finished Decision Points by George Bush and just so happens that my father was reading a George Bush biography. After comparing notes, we found that the biography had statements that contradicted the autobiography.
I hope Steve Jobs is working on an autobiography.
Twitter: @Shannon_RHP
In response to The Steve Jobs Biography: 3 Things We Want it to Discuss
Shannon posted on October 3, 2011
I’ve never listened to an audio book. To me, it’s not comparable to reading. But the first person to pique my interest in audio books is Sarah Vowell. I’ve never read any of her books but I heard her speak at the National Book Festival last week and apparently she goes the extra mile for her audio books.
Twitter: @Shannon_RHP
In response to Conversation of the Week: Audio Books and Celebrity Readers
Shannon posted on October 3, 2011
I think paper books will disappear but I don’t think it will be within the next decade.
I don’t like the idea of e-books right now but its just the resistance to change. I just started using an electronic calendar within the last year and now I don’t write my schedule down at all anymore.
Hate it or love it it’s coming. And we will all adapt because we will have no other choice.
Twitter: @Shannon_RHP
In response to inTouch: Will Paper Books Completely Disappear…Soon?
Daniel Beyfuss posted on October 3, 2011
I read somewhere that Burt Reynolds is doing audio books! First on my list.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Audio Books and Celebrity Readers
Donna posted on October 3, 2011
This is a really tough question; personally, I don’t think I’ve seen a movie that was better than the book. Good thoughts on the Godfather though – but I never read that book and can’t compare the two!
In response to Conversation of the Week: Is the Movie EVER Better than the Book?
Mike posted on October 2, 2011
As Seth mentioned in his blog post last week -”Go ahead and invent your own cover if you like. Weird is everywhere you look, even the mirror.” So I thought I’d make it easy for any weirdoes like me to do so. You can create your own book cover at http://www.customweareallweird.com.
Enjoy!
In response to Seth Godin Says We Are All Weird
inReads posted on October 1, 2011
Thanks, Troy!
In response to Writers Like Her: An Interview with Martha Southgate
Troy Johnson posted on October 1, 2011
I added a link to the article on AALBC.com, http://aalbc.com/authors/martha_southgate.htm and will share via social media Peace.
In response to Writers Like Her: An Interview with Martha Southgate
Troy Johnson posted on October 1, 2011
Great interview Stacia!
In response to Writers Like Her: An Interview with Martha Southgate
Bryce Wilson posted on September 30, 2011
Nicely done, though I take issue with the idea that there is anything particularly incongruous about Catholicism leading to sharp subversive writing.
O’Connor may stand above but she does not stand alone. I mean look at Graham Greene, Walker Percy, GK Chesterton (who gets labeled a conservative today but lets not forget that he inspired Michael Collins). If you go out into the realms of genre fiction you find interesting authors like William Peter Blatty, Russell Kirk, Arthur Machen and Mark Samuels.
What Pauline Kael termed “The Catholic Imagination” always has been and always will be awful potent.
In response to inRetrospect: Flannery O’Connor
Michael Brooks posted on September 28, 2011
To Kill A Mockingbird, was a superb adaption from book, to film.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Is the Movie EVER Better than the Book?
Bryce Wilson posted on September 28, 2011
@ Gia: It’s a tough one but worth it.
@ Felicia: Yeah the movie meant well and had some good things, particularly Stanley Tucci. I just don’t know if this is a book that was meant to translate.
In response to Cult Beat: The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
Gia Manry posted on September 28, 2011
Thanks for the kind words, Troy!
In response to True Blood’s Tanya Wright on Writing, Acting, and Directing
Gia Manry posted on September 28, 2011
I haven’t read The Godfather but I hear the focus kind of drifts a lot compared to the movie.
I’ve also heard that the last Harry Potter movie is better than the last book, although I’m behind on the movies. Since I was so dissatisfied with the last two books I wonder if I would feel the same way!
In response to Conversation of the Week: Is the Movie EVER Better than the Book?
Gia Manry posted on September 28, 2011
Well, I guess Moore hasn’t been in the news a lot lately, so I can sort of see where this probably came from
But I think he should try to take up the Governor’s offer instead! I’m going to be in Atlanta over the holidays and I would make sure to pop into a shop there and grab a copy, “for the luls,” as the kids say!
In response to inTouch: Michael Moore Tries to Ban His Book from Being Sold in Georgia
Troy Johnson posted on September 28, 2011
Nice article and nicer site! We posted an letter recently written by Tanya Wright seeking support for her film: http://aalbc.it/tanyafilm
In response to True Blood’s Tanya Wright on Writing, Acting, and Directing
Felicia.Pride posted on September 28, 2011
Oh the Godfather. I didn’t read the book. I did read the screenplay again though!
In response to Conversation of the Week: Is the Movie EVER Better than the Book?
Nichelle posted on September 27, 2011
Bridges of Madison County
The Godfather
In response to Conversation of the Week: Is the Movie EVER Better than the Book?
Wendy posted on September 27, 2011
I actually never read the book, but the movie of The Godfather is one of the best movies ever made and you don’t really hear people rave about the book in the same way. Anyone who read it care to set me straight?
In response to Conversation of the Week: Is the Movie EVER Better than the Book?
Ariel posted on September 27, 2011
This is wonderful! I may have to get an iPad to take advantage of it. What a great idea, thank you! Hopefully this doesn’t put too many dramaturgs out of work.
In response to A Glimpse into the Digital Humanities: Mobile Shakespeare
Felicia.Pride posted on September 27, 2011
I read it some years back, but really enjoyed it. I didn’t see the movie, although I read the screenplay!
In response to Cult Beat: The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
Gia Manry posted on September 27, 2011
I haven’t gotten around to reading this myself, but I really should.
In response to Cult Beat: The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
Gia Manry posted on September 27, 2011
I bet this would have been really fun when I was performing in A Midsummer Night’s Dream in high school!
In response to A Glimpse into the Digital Humanities: Mobile Shakespeare
Felicia.Pride posted on September 27, 2011
This is a tough question. I really have to think hard. Off the top of my head I don’t think I’ve ever seen a movie that was better than the book. Hmm…
In response to Conversation of the Week: Is the Movie EVER Better than the Book?
Bryce Wilson posted on September 27, 2011
Two recent exceptions to the rule would be Shutter Island, which is equal to the book in most parts and has one final twist of the screw that makes the ending better.
The other would be Let Me In. Which is not only one of few times that the film is better than the book, but one of the few times the American remake is superior to the foreign original. All credit to Richard Jenkins, the man with the saddest eyes in the universe.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Is the Movie EVER Better than the Book?
Clinton posted on September 26, 2011
Chai… Achebe grow up. WTF? 1million Dollars for a name you also stole from W.B. Yeats and you refused? Claiming rights that suck. TFU there. Oh poor 50… It’s Ok sha. Make achebe chop him title. Nonsense. SMH
In response to inTouch: Chinua Achebe vs. 50 Cent
Clinton posted on September 26, 2011
Walahi… Achebe grow up. WTF? 1million Dollars for a name you also stole from W.B. Yeats and you refused? Claiming rights that suck. TFU there. Oh poor 50… It’s Ok sha. Make achebe chop him title. Nonsense. SMH
In response to inTouch: Chinua Achebe vs. 50 Cent
Sadly posted on September 26, 2011
What about the banning/suppression of Keeley Thomson: Demon Girl?
A lot of people keep talking about old books that aren’t seriously being threatened, when this one is being threatened right now in one of the biggest covert squelching efforts in modern history.
In response to Banned Books Week
Gia Manry posted on September 26, 2011
I technically only ‘read’ the audiobook version, but I think Jurassic Park and probably most of the intensely visual films are particularly apt to having this happen. Certain horror films, too…I’ve always heard Psycho is way better as a movie than as a book, and I think that’s a combination of it being a horror flick and a particularly excellent director!
And this might be a bit controversial, but I personally would rather watch the Lord of the Rings trilogy (extended edition!) than re-read the books, which I find pretty dry. I think Tolkien did some phenomenal world-building, the sort that still impacts fantasy to this day in a major way…but his writing is a bit tough for me to stick to!
In response to Conversation of the Week: Is the Movie EVER Better than the Book?
Daniel Beyfuss posted on September 26, 2011
This is a very tough question…I’m thinking Shawshank? Maybe Jaws? What says ye?
In response to Conversation of the Week: Is the Movie EVER Better than the Book?
Jada Bradley posted on September 26, 2011
Finding a title does stretch the brain, true. Just composing the title for an article or blog post is not easy, so it is much more difficult for a longer work.
In response to inTouch: Are We Out of Titles….Or Are We Out of Ideas?
Brooke posted on September 26, 2011
Settling on a title was excruciating. You want it to encompass the theme of your book but finding those few perfect words is so difficult.
In response to inTouch: Are We Out of Titles….Or Are We Out of Ideas?
Daniel Beyfuss posted on September 26, 2011
My sister is in the process of getting her first novel published and she was asked to think up a few alternative titles. This whole process of finding a title is strange.
In response to inTouch: Are We Out of Titles….Or Are We Out of Ideas?
Tom Milton posted on September 25, 2011
I consider Fitzgerald one of the three most important American writers of his generation. It’s ironic that he wasn’t more sensitive to ethnic slurs since he himself suffered from them as a relatively poor Irish boy at Princeton.
In response to inRetrospect: F. Scott Fitzgerald on Encouraging Forgiveness
Michael Brooks posted on September 24, 2011
Remarkable story , Dicksoian flair, very good, enjoyable, coming of age.
In response to Jamrach’s Menagerie
Gia Manry posted on September 23, 2011
I’ve been meaning to read this for ages.
In response to Unleashing the IdeaVirus
Gia Manry posted on September 22, 2011
Donna, I love the thought of a few bookshelves devoted entirely to Silverstein…preferably reachable by the young’uns!
In response to New Shel Silverstein Collection – Every Thing On It
Jon posted on September 22, 2011
haha, that would be nice, too!
In response to infoGraphic: Groupon for Writers
Donna posted on September 22, 2011
I’ve been hearing lots of buzz on the new release and I’m excited to pick this one up and add to our Shel Silverstein family library! What a lasting impression his work has had on us all…
In response to New Shel Silverstein Collection – Every Thing On It
Gia Manry posted on September 21, 2011
Meg, I think you’re right…it’s just hard to know where the line is, I bet!
In response to Conversation of the Week: What Power Should Publishers Have Over an Author’s Work?
Gia Manry posted on September 21, 2011
Daniel, this is fascinating to me…I haven’t read any Silverstein as an adult but Where the Sidewalk Ends, Falling Up, and The Giving Tree were major classics of my childhood! I want to check out the new book and see what I think now that I’m (sort of) a grown-up
In response to New Shel Silverstein Collection – Every Thing On It
Felicia.Pride posted on September 21, 2011
November!
In response to Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (and Other Concerns)
Meg @ A Bookish Affair posted on September 21, 2011
I think that publishers should have some editing reign over the story but if their editing crosses over the line of actually changing fundamental parts of the story, it probably shouldn’t be done.
In response to Conversation of the Week: What Power Should Publishers Have Over an Author’s Work?
Gia Manry posted on September 21, 2011
This sounds fun (…and familiar!). I’ll have to check it out!
In response to Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (and Other Concerns)
Daniel Beyfuss posted on September 21, 2011
I love these kinds of history books. Never gave Garfield a second thought until now. I’ll have to pick this one up.
In response to inSide Books: The Destiny of the Republic by Candice Millard
Felicia.Pride posted on September 20, 2011
Check out our interview with Rebecca Skloot: http://www.inreads.com/blog/2011/05/23/inauthors-interview-with-rebecca-skloot/
In response to The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Felicia.Pride posted on September 20, 2011
I think she’s pretty hilarious.
In response to Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (and Other Concerns)
Felicia.Pride posted on September 20, 2011
Very interested in reading this. I think there’s a lot of value in the lean startup concept.
In response to The Lean Startup, How Today’s Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses
Gia Manry posted on September 20, 2011
This is an amazing article about the prejudices faced by women in the world of gaming– and frankly, while written by a guy, it blows quite a few female-written articles on the same topic right out of the water.
In response to To My Someday Daughter, by Geordie Tait – a Magic: the Gathering Miscellaneous Article
Felicia.Pride posted on September 20, 2011
@Gia: Oh, but I am horrified with you!
In response to Conversation of the Week: What Power Should Publishers Have Over an Author’s Work?
Felicia.Pride posted on September 20, 2011
@Gia, you’ve covered in my opinion when editors should step in regarding content. However publishers sometimes do have expertise in cover design, book titles, marketing stuff. I stress sometimes.
In response to Conversation of the Week: What Power Should Publishers Have Over an Author’s Work?
Marquis posted on September 20, 2011
Im pretty sure there was not enough negotiation frm ’50′ to meet the terms of Achebe and so off went the deal. True African Icon treasure Respect over money.
In response to inTouch: Chinua Achebe vs. 50 Cent
Gia Manry posted on September 19, 2011
Donna and Felicia, I’m curious– what kinds of things SHOULD an editor step up and suggest? Obviously grammar/spelling/structure/flow, but when you get into actual content, what IS appropriate for them to suggest changes to?
In response to Conversation of the Week: What Power Should Publishers Have Over an Author’s Work?
Wendy posted on September 19, 2011
Common’s appearance on Jon Stewart was incredible. The controversy about Common’s invitation to the White House is mind-numbing but handled in classic Jon Stewart style. Absolutely hilarious.
In response to Rapper/Actor Common Talks Memoir, Good Storytelling, and Why He Hasn’t Gone Digital
Michael Brooks posted on September 19, 2011
Very interestin tragi-comedy, dysfunctional family in the mid-west. Well wriiten
In response to Freedom
Felicia.Pride posted on September 19, 2011
As a writer who also has worked in publishing, there are times when publishers should step in–sometimes they do know what is best when it comes to sales. But overall, the publishing industry plays it safe, is too stuck on trends, and really needs to better embrace diversity. And well, publishers and authors usually don’t have collaborative relationships. They should.
In response to Conversation of the Week: What Power Should Publishers Have Over an Author’s Work?
Donna posted on September 19, 2011
I understand the point of publishing is to make money but this sounds a bit like “false advertising” to market something as chic lit when it is not. As far as the characters sexual orientation – how horrible if today, fictional characters are being put in the closet. I’m a bit shocked at this one and hope there’s a story behind the story; if not, yes, this crosses a line to be sure with publisher/editors. I think this just points out how critical the relationship between author and editor. Yes, money is the bottom line but there also needs to be respect and integrity in the process.
In response to Conversation of the Week: What Power Should Publishers Have Over an Author’s Work?
Gia Manry posted on September 19, 2011
I saw the trailer for the upcoming movie based on this book (“John Carter”) and I’m really excited! It looks stunning! So I decided to snatch this book up (it’s free on the Kindle) and give it a try. I’m enjoying it a lot so far!
In response to A Princess of Mars – Phoenix Science Fiction Classics
Gia Manry posted on September 19, 2011
I personally think that this is a really complicated issue. After all, most publishers aren’t non-profit organizations; it’s their job to sell the most copies they can, and the author benefits from that too, assuming it’s a standard royalties-based package. So while I understand Courtney’s unhappiness about being packaged at ChickLit and respect her decision, it’s hard for me to blame the publisher and marketing team for their decision, too.
I’m horrified, however, at the change of a character’s sexual orientation. That article is a fascinating read (it also dives back into the past when authors might be asked to change a character’s race), and I personally think this is something that authors AND readers should come down against, hard!
The difference between the two is that Courtney’s issue was primarily about the /marketing/ of a book, whereas Smith and Brown’s problem had to do with actually changing the /content/ of the book. Editors are obviously there to improve a work, and again, I understand where they’re coming from…but I think this move crosses the line.
In response to Conversation of the Week: What Power Should Publishers Have Over an Author’s Work?
Gia Manry posted on September 19, 2011
Daniel, for those of us who already have a Prime account (it pays for itself on the shipping, trust me!), it’s a particularly fun idea…especially since my household has two voracious readers!
That said, I’m most concerned about the impact on libraries– corporation will figure out their ways to profit. Perhaps smaller libraries will simply have to refocus themselves as places to go to read and participate in activities, like a reading-centric community center, and less on their book stock? I mean, really, if the problem is that no one is going to libraries for their physical books– which must be one of the major operating costs of the library –I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before a few of them experiment with shifting away from them somewhat.
It sounds scary to think of a library that’s not focused on books themselves, but do you think it could wind up being the future for all but the biggest metro libraries?
In response to inTouch: Amazon Wants to be the Literary Netflix?
Daniel Beyfuss posted on September 19, 2011
I actually think this is a great idea. The fee seems a bit steep but I have a feeling it’ll come down as more people sign up. Netflix worked brilliantly, so why not books?
In response to inTouch: Amazon Wants to be the Literary Netflix?
Donna posted on September 19, 2011
I’m a bit of a traditionalist myself; having said that Amazon is wonderful way to order those books I have on my list. But, almost weekly I still head to my local indie bookstore to walk around, explore, talk with the staff and hear about their picks and see what authors are coming to town… it’s a treat for me and my daugther! Amazon, as great as they are with pricing and delivery, can’t provide that kind of experience!
In response to Conversation of the Week: Amazon, For Better or for Worse?
Donna posted on September 19, 2011
This is definitely a book I’ll add to my shelf; what a powerful interview. And, how cool that one of his favs is The Four Agreements – a favorite of mine as well. Thanks for this interview.
In response to Rapper/Actor Common Talks Memoir, Good Storytelling, and Why He Hasn’t Gone Digital
Bryce Wilson posted on September 17, 2011
Thanks for the head’s up. I’ve been meaning to check out Voices Of A Distant Star. Good to know he’s not just a flash in the pan. A bit of Ghibli influence is never a bad thing ; )
In response to inSide Books: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
Gia Manry posted on September 17, 2011
Of course! I wish the theater in Seattle where I saw it had been a little more packed. What a beautiful film!
Here’s one for you to keep an eye out for…it’s not available in the U.S. yet but it premiered at Otakon in Baltimore this past summer. The Japanese title is Hoshi o Ou Kodomo and it’s a fantasy adventure/drama. It’s mostly kid-friendly and it’s simply stunning. The director, Makoto Shinkai, is best-known for his near single-handed anime Voices of a Distant Star, but give him a staff and it turns out that he makes a phenomenal full-length film! A little Ghibli-derivative at times
But beautiful and strongly-written. I interviewed Shinkai at Otakon as well and he’s young, thoughtful, and really loves the medium. He makes me hopeful for the medium’s future 
Also, studio Madhouse is currently finishing up Kon’s last film, Yume-miru Kikai, so there will at least be one more sendoff for Kon, who passed on WAY too early.
In response to inSide Books: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
Bryce Wilson posted on September 17, 2011
Glad to see someone glad to see some love for Summer Wars. I hope that Hosada makes some more movies soon. After the death of Satoshi Kon there are far too few people making interesting anime.
Have you seen The Girl Who Leapt Through Time?
In response to inSide Books: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
Bryce Wilson posted on September 17, 2011
Well just for the record I’m a pretty big Stephen King fan in general:
http://sonofdansemacabre.blogspot.com/2011/09/tales-of-tarot-part-5-stephen-king.html
http://sonofdansemacabre.blogspot.com/2011/09/ok-before-we-get-started-lets-just-go.html
This one just isn’t in the top tier.
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: Short E-Stories?
Gia Manry posted on September 16, 2011
On Writing is brilliant. I also love his columns in Entertainment Weekly…I haven’t subscribed to the mag in ages but I sometimes pick it up when I’m traveling, mostly for his column!
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: Short E-Stories?
Felicia.Pride posted on September 16, 2011
King’s On Writing is one of the best books about writing. And you have to admire his discipline.
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: Short E-Stories?
Felicia.Pride posted on September 16, 2011
Really looking forward to this panel!
In response to What Cities Play Characters in Your Favorite Books?
Daniel Beyfuss posted on September 16, 2011
A 20% discount on anti-depressants with the purchase of an anti-anxiety medication of equal or lesser value would be nice too.
In response to infoGraphic: Groupon for Writers
Daniel Beyfuss posted on September 16, 2011
I have a love/bored to death relationship wit Stephen King. My sister was kind enough to let me read this story on her device (I do not yet own one) but I found it rather dull. King tends to be long winded and sometimes thinks he’s funnier than he really is. Don’t get me wrong, he has his moments, but this just isn’t one of them.
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: Short E-Stories?
EditorEric posted on September 16, 2011
I don’t mind vampires changing over the years. Like other monsters, they represent our fears and these fears change over time too. Political fears, fears of disease, mental fears, sexual fears… I suspect the original vamps were created to represent the dark ages, the past out of which we had emerged, which we feared we could be drawn back into by the beasts that remain in us, in our blood – while today’s undead have more to do with sexuality. The beautiful dead of Twilight & other teen-oriented dramas focus on the fears of young people becoming adults, changes in their bodies, changes in their social lives, sexual expectations….
In response to Breaking Dawn Trailer: What Happened to the Blood-Sucking Fiends I Loved?
Gia Manry posted on September 16, 2011
Glad to see some love for Summer Wars– what a great movie! (I was thinking about it all through the description of this book.)
Will definitely have to check it out!
In response to inSide Books: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
Gia Manry posted on September 16, 2011
I’d like someone to hit up the “Funny Ha-Ha: Comedy in Comics” panel. Actually I wish I was going myself, so I could say hi to Kate Beaton
In response to Brooklyn Book Festival: Help Us Cover this Monster Literary Event
Gia Manry posted on September 16, 2011
I’m a little surprised 50 Cent wasn’t aware of the book…or at least that he admits to not knowing about it.
In response to inTouch: Chinua Achebe vs. 50 Cent
Kristina Variano posted on September 15, 2011
Check out the vampire cruise and ask them yourself! Do some “on the water” reporting!
http://vampsatsea.com/
It looks like this cruise might appeal to the vampire traditionalist like you Dan!
In response to Breaking Dawn Trailer: What Happened to the Blood-Sucking Fiends I Loved?
Lilly posted on September 15, 2011
I was looking eervyhwree and this popped up like nothing!
In response to inTouch: The Help Stirs the Pot and Fosters Dialogue
Daniel Beyfuss posted on September 15, 2011
This is the true story of Moby Dick, or at least the story Moby Dick was based on. You think you’re job sucks? Trying whaling. Well, don’t actually, because it’s a terrible thing, but read what these guys went through and ask yourself how willing you’d be to eat your friends.
In response to The Whaleship Essex, The True Story of Moby Dick
Gia Manry posted on September 15, 2011
Leah, that’s a really great metaphor!
In response to Breaking Dawn Trailer: What Happened to the Blood-Sucking Fiends I Loved?
Leah posted on September 14, 2011
Oh goodness, Twilight.
I made the tragic mistake of reading the first book, and here’s my take.
The Twilight series is like eating a bag of cheese puffs. They have the obvious appealing qualities that are totally addictive, but have no substance whatsoever. You can go through a whole bag of cheese puffs and at the end you’re like, “Wow, I just ate a delicious bag of… nothing.”
Twilight is the literary equivalent of this. It has romance, and a bad boy, and teenage “nobody understands me” drama, and vampires, but has no real SUBSTANCE. 13 year old girls eat this stuff up for the same reason they eat reality TV up, it’s all the same thing. Meyer is smart; she’s writing for a specific audience and making millions, and there’s nothing wrong with that. We’ll just have to live with the single-handed ruining of vampire culture for the younger generation. Meanwhile, we’ll enjoy our fright night and ignore Sparkles McGee.
I agree though, I don’t understand the craze surrounding the movie especially. It’s absurd.
In response to Breaking Dawn Trailer: What Happened to the Blood-Sucking Fiends I Loved?
Daniel Beyfuss posted on September 14, 2011
I have no problem with the fans – hey, it’s your choice what you like and don’t like. But the vampire belongs to all of us, and I will defend the malformed, murderous, snaggle-toothed variety any day of the week.
In response to Breaking Dawn Trailer: What Happened to the Blood-Sucking Fiends I Loved?
Mairead posted on September 14, 2011
I think the stories would be popular if they were zombies, witches, warlocks, soothsayers, robots, aliens, cyborgs, or any other type of supernatural being. It’s the kind of young adult love story that 14 year old girls can’t get enough of. Besides, wizards were taken.
In response to Breaking Dawn Trailer: What Happened to the Blood-Sucking Fiends I Loved?
Gia Manry posted on September 14, 2011
Dan, good point!
In response to Conversation of the Week: Amazon, For Better or for Worse?
Gia Manry posted on September 14, 2011
I think the “Twihards” get a bad rap– most of them are either young girls (in which case, why all the hate? Young girls and boys like all sorts of “awful” stuff, who cares?) and/or are part of a self-sustaining fan community with members as devoted as, say, Trekkies. So why are Trekkies just funny but Twilight fans outright detested? I just don’t get the sheer vitriol of it all!
As for the writing, I’d just call it average. Honestly, it’s only maybe a half-step below Harry Potter in sheer artfulness– both utilize a very straight-forward and simple style. The difference comes in the complexity of plot and the layers of meaning, both of which I think Rowling offers in spades compared to Meyers.
On the other hand I’ve read an AWFUL lot of garbage over the years, so maybe my scale is a little wonky
In response to Breaking Dawn Trailer: What Happened to the Blood-Sucking Fiends I Loved?
Daniel Beyfuss posted on September 14, 2011
Finally, someone who gets me! Amen sister, it’s time the vampire from Salem’s Lot or some of the guys from Fright Night took a trip down to Sissy Town and laid waste to these wannabe Nosferatu.
In response to Breaking Dawn Trailer: What Happened to the Blood-Sucking Fiends I Loved?
Buffy posted on September 14, 2011
Vampires are mean and scary and will suck your blood until you die (if they don’t turn you yourself into a mean scary bloodsucking fiend). If they ARE good and don’t drink human blood, it’s because they were cursed with a soul or have a chip planted in their head.
REAL vampires are soulless, have no reflection, hate garlic (no Italian food, bummer), burst into flame if the sun hits them, do NOT get anybody pregnant (um, hello, they’re dead), but they’re totally allowed to be broody if they’ve been cursed with a soul or totally pissed off if they have a chip in their head.
Also, that sissy Twilight vampire wears freakin’ DOCKERS. If Dracula himself showed up, and he was wearing Dockers, I’d laugh him back to Yuppieburg, Dorksylvania. Fortunately, though, Dracula has impeccable taste.
ANYway, this whole “vampires are cool” thing is just going to get people really dead when they actually do meet a vampire.
Also, the writing in those books is crap. That is all.
In response to Breaking Dawn Trailer: What Happened to the Blood-Sucking Fiends I Loved?
Daniel Beyfuss posted on September 14, 2011
Gia – yeah, with quantity you lose quality, I agree with that, but sometimes you find gold amongst the trash. If it weren’t for the ability to buck the system, to say to hell with the established means for creating artistic success, we might never have had the Ramones.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Amazon, For Better or for Worse?
Gia Manry posted on September 14, 2011
I haven’t read this yet– Gaiman’s been pretty hit-or-miss with me (loved Neverwhere, Sandman, and most of his short stories; thought Stardust was pretty ‘meh;’ and could not get into American Gods). Should I pick this up?
In response to Fragile Things, Short Fictions and Wonders
Gia Manry posted on September 14, 2011
I will say that by and large Amazon has been great for the sheer volume of stuff I read! I went through a couple of years where I hardly read any books for fun, mostly just graphic novels or re-reading past favorites. Then I got a Kindle
In response to Conversation of the Week: Amazon, For Better or for Worse?
Drew posted on September 13, 2011
Good list. I also like Stoner by John Williams. Guy rules.
In response to Back to School: 7 Novels that Tackle The World of Academia
Zoelle Egner posted on September 13, 2011
Recently saw Brendan Constantine read at a night of poetry at the Getty Museum. Among a line-up of some of my favorite contemporary poets, he contributed my favorite piece of the evening, so I bought this. And oh, Brendan Constantine, how excellent you are when you are at your best. Sometimes you lose me, it’s true. But when I’m with you, I’m nowhere else (and for someone as easily distracted as me, that’s saying something.) I was literally reading some of these poems out loud at the bus stop. There are significant portions of Los Angeles that think I am a crazy person because of you. But I don’t even care, because every word was worth it. Also, some of the best section titles I’ve ever seen: “The House of the World”, “Crimewave” and (my favorite) “Hyenas in the Temples of Pleasure.” If you are a fan of contemporary poetry, you should probably pick this up as soon as humanly possible. Really, I’m doing you a favor.
As a side note, I’ll likely be reviewing this book for the next issue of Muzzle Magazine. But I’d love other peoples’ thoughts on some of the pieces in it. Let me know if you happen to get it, as I’d really like to mull over a few of the poems with other humans!
In response to Birthday Girl with Possum
Jen C posted on September 13, 2011
I don’t know much about the book business, per se. However, I think Amazon has been fantastic for students. It’s really broken up the textbook market. I saved so much money in grad school by buying my books on amazon – both new and used.
As for the ebook market as I’m something of a traditionalist myself. I like feeling the book in my hand, writing in the margins, tabbing up the pages etc. Maybe you can do similar things with an ebook now?
As for Borders, you have to keep up with the big boys. Barnes and Noble came out with an ereader, as much as I am not inclined to buy one, Borders should have done the same.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Amazon, For Better or for Worse?
Gia Manry posted on September 13, 2011
Daniel, that leads me to wonder…if it becomes easier and cheaper for writers to step around traditional publishing, the role of bloggers and sites like inReads will certainly become considerably more important in terms of helping people sort through the garbage to find the gems, as it were!
Not that traditional publishers have done a *flawless* job of holding back the floodgates, but considering how big most publishers’ “slush piles” get, you have to wonder what will happen to the state of literature if those books’ authors self-publish them, often without the benefit of so much as an editor (to make things cheaper)!
…Actually I guess that’s sort of what the “fanfiction” world is like. Sure, there are some well-written stories out there based on other authors’ works, but there’s so much poorly-written junk!
In response to Conversation of the Week: Amazon, For Better or for Worse?
Daniel Beyfuss posted on September 12, 2011
I think the publishing world is going down the same path as the music industry. More and more writers are embracing the DIY work ethic, realizing how incredibly difficult it is to ‘get published’ by a big house and taking matters into their own hands. Amazon is giving these writers the tools they need to get their work out there and I think that will ensure continued success. Those writers who work hard, promote their work and take advantage of new technologies will be successful. But it’s going to take some time.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Amazon, For Better or for Worse?
Gia Manry posted on September 12, 2011
I’ve been obsessively following the Kindle Daily Deal for the last week and have bought several of those books, usually $1.99 to $2.99 (regular prices ranging from $12.99 to $22.99). It’s great!
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: E-Books are Great for Cheapos
Gia Manry posted on September 12, 2011
By and large, I think Amazon makes it easier for product producers (including authors!) to reach consumers…and I think it makes it a bit harder for them to make a lot of profit. But I won’t pretend to be enough of a business expert to know how that’s going to play out!
As for Borders, I’m sad for the store’s employees. I also have a certain nostalgia for the store; Borders (and then-buyer Kurt Hassler) are widely credited with bringing manga (Japanese comics) to mass audiences, which I have benefited from greatly over the years! I remember being what is now known as a “hobotaku” (a kid who sits in the store reading the manga, usually on the floor) before there was such a term, in my local Borders almost every Saturday.
I’m sad the chain is effectively gone, but I think that it made some poor business choices in a tough market, and I don’t feel that the company has been unfairly manhandled or anything, either.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Amazon, For Better or for Worse?
Thandinkosi Sibisi posted on September 11, 2011
You mention that Americans read very few books and that the Kindle’s ability to hold 3500 books is overkill for just about everyone.(I live in South Africa and people read even fewer books there!)
What you do not mention is why anyone would buy an e reader in the first place.For example why would a person who reads one book a year buy a kindle?Common sense tells me that s/e would merely be making a fashion statement.
Now why did I buy a kindle? I read about 10 or more popular to serious science books(eg Roger Penrose’s “Parallel Universes” Steve Hawking’s “Grand Design”. Is a kindle merely a fashion statement in my case. I do not think so! I travel a lot and I do not read the books sequentially but simultaneously.Need I say more?
I am frankly not interested in the debate whether ebooks will ever replace “real books”.There is no doubt though that ebooks are convenient to people who read several books a year and do not want to be lugging several physical books around.
In response to E-Reader Reality Check: 4 Limitations to Consider
louise Hartwell posted on September 9, 2011
I have a kindle before the ads. I would still pay the higher price not to have ads. I don’t mind the ones at the back telling of the authors books but not regular ads.
In response to inTouch: Will Readers Buy the Idea of Ads in E-Books?
mammysfave posted on September 9, 2011
I love my ereader and one of the best things about it is all the free books I have gotten from indie authors just starting out. Since they are free I would not be opposed to the author making a little money from ads as long as they are at the beginning or end of book. However, if I am paying for a book I would be pissed to have ads included.
In response to inTouch: Will Readers Buy the Idea of Ads in E-Books?
Bryce Wilson posted on September 8, 2011
I would just like to point out that since submitting this column, I’ve bought two more ebooks at a greatly discounted rate. Let The Right One In for 4.99 and Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy for 1.99.
Neither was of course directed to me by Barnes And Noble. I stumbled upon Let The Right One In, and AMAZON let me know about the discount on Bonhoeffer. Hi-Ho!!
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: E-Books are Great for Cheapos
juny bayard posted on September 6, 2011
I love Amazon, always will, always the best prices without the hassle (no coupons, going to the mall at certain times, etc). I rarely walked into Borders, the prices for CDs were outrageous, Borders killed itself, and lastly, all those crying over BOrders demise, where were you when Borders killed so many mom and pop indies book stores?
In response to Conversation of the Week: Amazon, For Better or for Worse?
Jon posted on September 4, 2011
Yes! I was thinking shoe rack, too!
In response to infoGraphics: Future Uses of the Bookshelf
Penny posted on September 3, 2011
Oh yes, I forgot–my favorite thing (NOT) is the “This book is obvious;y self-published” when the book is not self-published, and the criticism of the edit. No book is perfect. Ihave a second edition Charles Dickens where he aologizes for the mistakes in hos first edition. Don’t people realize they are attacking a [erson’s livlihood? Writing isn’t a hobby. It is a profession. They shouldn’t buy from Amazon if they don’t want a surprise. If they walked into a bookstore they could presumedly get what they want.
In response to inTouch: Are Amazon Customer Reviews Biased? Do We Care?
Penny posted on September 3, 2011
Amazon directs readers away from books–I believe through this system. Reviews of my own books that don’t even come close to accurately describing a book are ridiculus–at one point some so-called reviewer decided akl the good reviews were written by me and got Amazon to remove them all—then buyers were sent by this person to a cmpetitor’s book—Now no book is perfect and Amazon tells publishers and authors it is okay to have friends, family, employees review books–but this is not true–In fact, Amazon in giving free books is encouraging this sort of thing–what I mean is the purpose seems to be to drive readers to other books, and they only do this when a small publisher starts to really sell– Hmmmmm—- It appears Amazon really is manipulating the market and the sales and all is not as it seems. I cringe now when I get good reviews, because I know the one star reviews will follow!
In response to inTouch: Are Amazon Customer Reviews Biased? Do We Care?
Krissie posted on September 2, 2011
Her mother *has* read this, I’m friends with her on Amazon and Facebook
Great blog post, Alice, I hadn’t heard about your book, but I’ll have to check it out
In response to inAuthors: Alice Ozma Riffs on How Parental Love Spurs Her Love for Words
nowsmytime posted on September 2, 2011
I hope your mother has read this and realizes how lucky she is. She is blessed to have a daughter to be proud of
In response to inAuthors: Alice Ozma Riffs on How Parental Love Spurs Her Love for Words
Bronson Arcuri posted on September 2, 2011
Autobio comics were exactly how I was able to get into reading comics. I’d really recommend ellerbisms (http://www.ellerbisms.com/?p=15), a free autobio webcomic.
In response to The Autobiographical Comic: Some Recommendations
Rob Clough posted on September 2, 2011
Eden, are you aware of the Graphic Classics line, edited by Tom Pomplun?
http://www.graphicclassics.com
In response to Literary Comics: Another Way to Consume the Classics
Charmaine posted on August 31, 2011
Ha! I love the idea of a bookshelf as a doll apartment. My mom would probably use to stack clothes. Perfect for a shoe rack, no?
In response to infoGraphics: Future Uses of the Bookshelf
LM Preston posted on August 30, 2011
You’re an author that thinks big. Diversify is the word. Publish some books traditionally, others in ebook, some in print. We have options now.
In response to Reconciling My E-Book
Larry IT posted on August 29, 2011
Great fantasy novel. It left me wanting more and I can’t wait for news on the next one. The transformation and abilities of the character were pretty cool.
In response to Drops from the Kingdom, The Silver Arrow
Lisa posted on August 28, 2011
Hi Andie, I wrote a short response in a recent interview about the reactions; you can see here. Thanks for your interest and your support! http://poetrytribune.blogspot.com/2011/08/interview-with-lisa-marie-basile.html
In response to Poetry Meets the World’s Oldest Profession
Liz posted on August 26, 2011
Great article! I would wager that at least 60% of my writing career/ steady work came from introductions to editors/agents from other writers. And without a network of supportive writer-friends to read drafts, give advice, share contacts, and let me vent on rough days, I don’t think I would have stayed a writer. And I have a handful of close friends–some in LA and some in New York–who I originally met in writers groups that I saw advertised on… craigslist.
In response to DIY: Networking off the Net
Jada Bradley posted on August 26, 2011
I hadn’t considered that–using it to improve reading speed…that was inventive. I agree–the trailer isn’t their best piece of promotion.
In response to inTouch: Do E-Books Need Soundtracks?
Andreas posted on August 26, 2011
I read the Sherlock Holmes book and it was a very nice experience. It took some pages to get used to but then it was easy to do. I think this might be good for improving your reading speed. If you set the speed at a little faster than you’re comfortable with and turn off the automatic speed function you push yourself to follow the marker even if you miss a few words here and there. I’m gonna try it because I don’t read that fast. I’m definately looking forward to new title releases. I think their trailer is laughable though. The power of six doesn’t seem to be available in my country. That sucks.
In response to inTouch: Do E-Books Need Soundtracks?
Dawn Kaczmar posted on August 25, 2011
I actually don’t know if I agree with you entirely–superstition is a hoax insofar as it does not have any scientific or physical consequence. However, if certain rituals succeed in calming the mind, however irrational, and that place of calm inspires one to write with more ease and inspiration, is it really a hoax? The light of a candle, the size of a font, or the shadows of a lonely night are not responsible for fine writing, no; but they are responsible for the effect they have on the writer, and are therefore indirectly connected to the writing process. People are irrational creatures; we have emotional and spiritual connections to stimulus and rituals. Certain atmospheres, locations, sounds, objects, and whatever else–serve to calm the mind. We study in libraries, we listen to fast music when we exercise, and we appreciate the aesthetic value a vase of flowers can bring to the room. None of these things are *responsible* for the effect, but they effect us nonetheless, and I’m not sure how that’s so different from superstitions of this sort. Unless you’re mistaking superstitions as routes to quick-success; the writer is responsible for his or her work, but also responsible for creating environments that will allow him or her to work well. I suppose superstition becomes a problem when one begins to rely on it more than oneself, or when the writing process becomes more about the superstition/ritual than the actual writing, which you seemed to indicate.
In response to Lost Among Words: Writers & Their Superstitions
Bronson Arcuri posted on August 25, 2011
For some reason, I’ve never been able to get through King Lear and this might be exactly the medium I need to get into it. On the other had I hated when one of my favorite sci-fi classics, Ender’s Game, was turned into a graphic novel.
In response to Literary Comics: Another Way to Consume the Classics
Amy Joy posted on August 25, 2011
Wow. I hadn’t ever considered getting superstitious about writing. I write when I feel it- when I absolutely can’t do anything else because the ideas are flowing through me like a rushing, roaring river. I write when I am sad, I write when I am happy, I write when I’m exhausted. I write when I don’t want to write. And usually, what I find is that I quickly get into it and all of the stress of life melts away.
Of course, now that you mentioned superstitions, I will be thinking about them. Before I know it, I am sure I will have created some crazy ones of my own.:)
Enjoy your final year of college, Christian.
-Amy Joy http://theacademieseries.com
In response to Lost Among Words: Writers & Their Superstitions
charles colley posted on August 24, 2011
Branding is, obviously, the result of a writer’s hard work. The problem for an author without his brand yet built, is that the reading public seems to no longer want to search for a new voice with a new story to tell. They seem to be satisfied with that same voice telling the same kind of tale, much like a TV series drones onward week after week, telling the same tale again and again with different clothes. On the other hand, the ebook world is affording me and other writers a chance at being seen and heard via low prices which entice a reader to say, ‘what is there to lose, paying 99 cents or two dollars for a new writer’s try at the brass ring\?’ We have some big successes, as you say, Ms. Hocking, Mr. Locke and others, nevermind whether you like their work or not. Obviously, many do, and I hope my own novels, working on number 3 getting into the ebook world at present, will ring the bell for lots of readers. thanks for your thoughts.
In response to inTouch: Are Mega-Bestsellers about the Books or the Branding?
Bronson Arcuri posted on August 24, 2011
I love any book by Marquez, and this was no exception. It was a perfect one day read, and even in such a short book Marquez was able to develop fascinating and believable characters and relationships. Loved it.
In response to Chronicle of a death foretold, a novel
Bronson Arcuri posted on August 24, 2011
Managing to not hear the end of the first Game of Thrones book was probably one of my finest achievements.
In response to inTouch: To Spoil or Not to Spoil?
Becca posted on August 24, 2011
Ugh, I hate being spoiled, even about stupid books. I was spoiled walking out of Borders by a mother/daughter talking about My Sister’s Keeper. Not exactly a big mystery novel, but still frustrating.
I don’t even like it when the back of a book tells me the premise is that X happens, but when the book starts, X hasn’t happened yet. I spend the beginning just waiting for what I know is going to happen to occur, just so I can get started on the fresh information.
But, I’m a horrible spoiler for the end of a chapter. If I am on the next to the last page and the end is on the page I can see, I’m totally going to read it before I get to it. I’ve had to read with my hand over the next page, just so I don’t ruin it for myself.
In response to inTouch: To Spoil or Not to Spoil?
Jada Bradley posted on August 24, 2011
THE ABSTINENCE TEACHER is the only Perrotta book I’ve read so far. In that book I found, as you’ve noted, sharp prose and a letdown in the third act. Still, it was a worthwhile read overall and I’m going to check out the excerpt of THE LEFTOVERS.
In response to inSide Books: The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta
Meg @ A Bookish Affair posted on August 24, 2011
I like being surprised but I can see how knowing an ending wouldn’t necessarily ruin a book if there is more than just a surprise ending to carry the book.
In response to inTouch: To Spoil or Not to Spoil?
Chris Muse posted on August 23, 2011
Maybe if Dr. Wm. Stuart Halsted hadn’t done Cocaine, he wouldn’t have been so paranoid about sterility, germs, and proper procedure in the Operating Theatre …
In response to inAuthors: Dr. Howard Markel Riffs on Cocaine and Amy Winehouse
Jada Bradley posted on August 22, 2011
I enjoyed the Manga Shakespeare version of “Much Ado About Nothing.” That play is very familiar to me and illustrations helped me see some lines in a new light.
In response to Literary Comics: Another Way to Consume the Classics
Christian Harder posted on August 22, 2011
Lara, thank you. I empathize with your angst. I’m trying, against all logic, to try and not get a “proper job”. We’ll see how that works out.
In response to Lost Among Words: A Young [Struggling] Writer’s Journal
pam posted on August 20, 2011
Amy’s use of cocaine and the role is played in her demise has been well documented. But I have read an in depth article in which her mother states that Amy had problems with recklessness from a very early age, before alcohol or drugs were a factor. And while brilliant Amy had trouble in school. This leads me to believe she had some other mental and emotional disorders that remained undiagnosed. Until we start looking deeper and treating the cause of drug and alcohol abuse, people will continue to abuse themselves in whatever ways they can find.
In response to inAuthors: Dr. Howard Markel Riffs on Cocaine and Amy Winehouse
Andrew Minot posted on August 19, 2011
Let’s stick to fiction for the moment, since that’s what most book clubs favor. I have been in a mixed-gender, mixed-age book group for three years now, and the one thing we have in common now (though not before our trek through the canonical, the highly-hyped, and the out-of-nowhere) is that you should never, ever believe what the legacy publishing houses say. They back the books they paid a lot for, and frankly a lot of acquisitions editors deserve to be fired. Recent duds, all frighteningly overwrought and overwritten: Matterhorn, Freedom, The Surrendered. Recent novels-approached-with-an-open-mind that nearly all of us wanted to hurl across the room with great force: The Privileges, Mr. Peanut. The sole source of recommendations that worked for all of us turned out to be the Best Novels of the Year lists from the Washington Post’s late lamented Book World, and there we gleaned some terrific fiction for grownups, notably Unfinished Desires and Deep Creek.
In response to inTouch: Are Mega-Bestsellers about the Books or the Branding?
Wendy posted on August 19, 2011
Thank you to David and Stephen for catching a careless grammatical error and thank you to WordPress for making it so easy to fix! Sorry to have detracted from the message of the piece and appreciate the chance to fix it for other inReaders.
In response to inTouch: Are Mega-Bestsellers about the Books or the Branding?
David Perrotta posted on August 19, 2011
“…others on the list have made the most of the cache attached to their names.”
That should be “cachet” rather than “cache”. In recent years, the two words seem to be increasingly confused with each other, beginning it seems, with members of the military in Iraq and Afghanistan referring to captured “weapons caches” and mistakenly pronouncing “cache” as “cachet”.
In response to inTouch: Are Mega-Bestsellers about the Books or the Branding?
Stephen Lee posted on August 19, 2011
Some interesting observations, but one glaring grammatical error jumped out at me while reading. (A shame, really, since it somewhat overshadowed your message for me.)
You wrote, “… he and some of the others on the list have made the most of the CACHE attached to their names.”
Shouldn’t that be “cachet,” as in reputation or esteem? “Cache” means a treasure trove or a temporary storage area for computer data.
In response to inTouch: Are Mega-Bestsellers about the Books or the Branding?
Jon posted on August 19, 2011
Thanks for all of the great comments, guys. I don’t think Amazon is good or bad–but I do think that we should encourage competition in the e-book market–80% of anything sounds like a monopoly–and I am glad to hear from so many small publishers who are doing just that.
In response to inRetro: Is Amazon Short-Changing Authors?
Bobbi Mumm posted on August 19, 2011
For the youngsters I think that the Riordan books and the Rowling books merit their fame. My kids can’t wait to read them and this enjoyment can’t only be a result of marketing. As a mystery fan, I was disappointed by the Steig Larsson book and had to struggle to get through the first one. I think this one coasted in on a wave of hype.
In response to inTouch: Are Mega-Bestsellers about the Books or the Branding?
Jada Bradley posted on August 19, 2011
J. Nelson Leith–Great point about the continuous feedback loop. As you can see I was cautious about not mentioning recent reading disappointments since some of them were well-buzzed and well-loved.
In response to inTouch: Are Mega-Bestsellers about the Books or the Branding?
Lorine Pergament posted on August 19, 2011
Good essay.
In response to inTouch: Are Mega-Bestsellers about the Books or the Branding?
Amelia Painter posted on August 19, 2011
Very good news for self-publishing e-book authors!
In response to Tech Tip: Put Your Head in the Kindle Cloud Reader
J. Nelson Leith posted on August 19, 2011
I fully sympathize with your experience with “much-anticipated” books. Sometimes, I am completely baffled by a book’s success.
I believe an internet-driven increase in the speed of positive feedback loops has a lot to do with success these days, particularly when everyone is trying to pile onto a buzzing bandwagon. Readers might not be responding so much to the book itself, but to the social implications of liking/disliking the book.
In response to inTouch: Are Mega-Bestsellers about the Books or the Branding?
lara posted on August 19, 2011
Great post
I aspire to be a successful publisher but with the industry like it is and the economy crashing around my soon to graduate ears I am more than aware of the need to find a ‘proper job’
All the best
In response to Lost Among Words: A Young [Struggling] Writer’s Journal
charles colley posted on August 18, 2011
My take on your commentary about Amazon is- Make Hay While the Sun Shines. Belatedly, I am learning the Kindle and other e-reader systems, prepping my many novels for them, 2 in the system so far. A long life in business, from franchise ownership to real estate to selling mortgages before our “Big Bust” has taught me that nothing lasts, so I better “Strike While the Iron is Hot.” Amazon has filled a huge void for writers and readers, so, say thanks, use it and roll with changes when they happen. That is how business and real life happen. thanks for your article.
In response to inRetro: Is Amazon Short-Changing Authors?
Mark O’Bannon posted on August 18, 2011
I think this system allows the PUBLIC to decide what is good and what is not good. The internet is just a way to magnify word of mouth advertising. If a book is poorly written, it will get bad reviews and won’t sell. Authors need to maintain the quality of their books by writing EXCELLENT stories. Word of mouth will kill the badly written books.
Back in the days of pulp fiction, authors cut their teeth on the short story. I believe that the short story will return now and this is an excellent way to build a following and to become better and better as a writer.
More online content (short stories) = higher ranking in the search engines and greater exposure to fans.
The most important people win (the authors and readers).
Booksellers will have to adapt to survive, though physical books will never go out entirely IMHO. I think ebooks just create more readers, expanding the market.
Agents need to change what they offer as a service to authors. If an agent wants to survive, they will learn how to MARKET ebooks. I’d gladly give an agent 15% of my sales if the agent knew anything about marketing (few people do).
Just a few thoughts.
One day soon, I’ll have to write an ebook on how to market books online….
Mark O’Bannon
http://www.betterstorytelling.net/blog
In response to inRetro: Is Amazon Short-Changing Authors?
Amy Edelman posted on August 17, 2011
Hi Jonathan,
Re: your comment that, “Anyone can contribute to the [Amazon] site, making separating the good from the bad difficult” and “In the future, could Amazon serve as the e-book’s gatekeeper, stepping into territory once controlled by traditional publishers?”
IndieReader (www.indiereader.com), the essential consumer guide to self-published books and the people who write them, was launched specifically to provide another venue for people looking for independent news and reviews on indie books.
Pls check us out and let me know what you think.
Thx,
Amy
IndieReader
In response to inRetro: Is Amazon Short-Changing Authors?
Theresa M. Moore posted on August 17, 2011
As an author and self-publisher I use Amazon only as a seller, and would enjoy a greater profit for my books if people bought them directly from me; but they don’t. Instead, they copy down the details and then look for a lower price on Amazon. I do not host Amazon links on my site for that reason. I do not feel the need to boost my competitors’ reach by doing so. As for sales at whatever percentage of royalties, the frequent glitches and dropoffs in service on Amazon and KDP should be a cause for concern, not celebration. Amazon does whatever it wants whenever it wants and never keeps its sellers in the loop. It behaves like it’s the only market in town; and its customers don’t care what happens to us authors.
In response to inRetro: Is Amazon Short-Changing Authors?
Edward Renehan posted on August 17, 2011
Publishing Kindle editions of our books with Amazon has been a great boon to my small publishing firm. We price our Kindle editions in the $3.95 and $4.95 range, and have enjoyed considerable success/remuneration. We’re very happy with both the sales and the publishing interface. – Ed Renehan, Managing Director, New Street Communications, LLC
In response to inRetro: Is Amazon Short-Changing Authors?
Liz posted on August 17, 2011
Great article! And I think it’s a great jumping off point for a broader dialogue on how readers DO have the power to collectively demand that Amazon operate more ethically and fairly with the other players in the book business.
As an author of a book with Simon and Schuster and the author of an ebook that I recently published through Kindle Direct, I think volumes could be written on why Amazon, in its current conception, is bad for book publishing. They short-change everyone, whether it’s indie authors, small publishers, and large publishers. Their reader reviews are often vitriolic and amazon takes so much of the elegance out of buying books. But that’s not the major problem:
We can’t look at Borders and independent bookstores closing and say, “Oh, the economy is bad” or “Oh, people don’t read anymore.” Amazon has such a grip on the book buying market that they can tell book publishers what discount they require on books–whether it’s Random House selling a highly-anticipated hardcover or a first-time indie author publishing her first ebook. Publishers often see their profit projections decimated when amazon requires a $15 discount on every copy of a big book that was supposed to save the publisher’s quarter… and no other bookstore can require–or compete with!–those discounts.
In terms of Amazon’s work with indie authors, taking 30%–or worse, 65%!–of sales for offering place to sell an ebook (with zero technical and marketing support) is a total rip-off. When we talk about Amanda Hocking selling 9,000 ebooks a day, it sounds like she must be a megamilionaire, but she’s actually only getting $.35 on her books’ $.99 list price. The 35% commission level for books under $.99 is shameful!
Amazon is a major company and they won’t voluntarily say, “Sure, we’ll stop trying to dominate this industry and cut into our profit margins so other businesses can thrive.”
We need more awareness–and outrage–among readers, writers, and everyone who loves books about what amazon is doing to writers and publishers that makes being in the book business even more complicated and unlucrative in these untenable times.
In response to inRetro: Is Amazon Short-Changing Authors?
Kalistri posted on August 17, 2011
Meanwhile, this is ridiculous. One website will never be the “gatekeeper” for online publishing. It only takes moderate internet search skills to find online books elsewhere. Good books will get found by one of the billions of people on the internet and word will get spread, no matter where it is.
Secondly, online writing isn’t only going to be about getting people to pay before they read your work. With free downloads so easy to find, the concept of supporting the artists you love is probably one of the major reasons to pay for a book at all, and anyone who thinks about it should realise that a direct donation is more cost effective for that goal.
My point being, online publishers are nothing more than a stepping stone towards cutting out the middle man between authors and consumers.
In response to inRetro: Is Amazon Short-Changing Authors?
Kalistri posted on August 17, 2011
@Andy,
Maybe the first two paragraphs read like that, but afterwards it swings in the other direction, and seems like an attempt to make Amazon sound evil. I mean, this quote is clearly not pro Kindle: “… in creating this new world for publishing under the umbrella of one website, have we exchanged one boss for another?”
Unless you mean that you think it’s intentionally written with poor arguements to make people interested in Kindle Direct? Even if that’s the case, I think the article scored a hit with the advertising thing… I mean, I haven’t looked at many Kindle books so I haven’t seen any of these fake books that it mentioned, but if it’s true, that is indeed pretty awful.
In response to inRetro: Is Amazon Short-Changing Authors?
Jean Arambula posted on August 17, 2011
A disclaimer: Snake Nation Press does not publish e-books.
I read a Tweet recently that readers are the only ones benefiting from the e-book bonanza. It seems the pirating of music is small, compared to how easy it is to steal e-books. I must admit, we saw that coming and really have not been concerned with entering the fray. Amazon has not been a friend to the small press, so why would they be a friend to the individual writer?
In response to inRetro: Is Amazon Short-Changing Authors?
Jada Bradley posted on August 17, 2011
As someone who is contemplating publishing with Amazon, I agree with this-
“Whether or not writers like Amazon’s policies, most do not have the fan base or the finances to shun it completely.”
I interviewed C.M. Mayo for this website and she formed a niche publishing company of her own to produce e-books and specialty paper books, but many authors will turn to Amazon because the profit margin they offer is hard to beat.
My thought is that since Amazon is one of many avenues for publication, an author can be selective about what they publish with Amazon. One of the authors interviewed for this story indicated that he will be selling some things on his own website.
Amazon has had issues with people repurposing the content of others and selling it and breaking down the barriers does mean that there is a lot more content out there, but that does not mean people will be unable to find books they will enjoy.
We are all in new territory here, but any new frontier only stays unstructured for so long…so I wonder if, as you note, we really want Amazon to be the gatekeeper for e-books?
In response to inRetro: Is Amazon Short-Changing Authors?
Andy posted on August 17, 2011
The headline is very misleading. It suggests information that Amazon isn’t playing fair with the authors. Instead, the article reads more like a commercial for the Kindle Direct program. I call shenanigans.
In response to inRetro: Is Amazon Short-Changing Authors?
Vic at Jane Austen’s World posted on August 17, 2011
While I like to read the occasional spin off, I prefer going back to Jane Austen and biographies about her life. There are outstanding authors, Lynn Shepherd being one of them. Murder at Mansfield Park placed an interesting twist to a novel that even many Austen afficionados have difficulty liking.
In response to Remixing Jane Austen
Bryce Wilson posted on August 16, 2011
Well I can certainly appreciate that Jason. And would that I had a hindsight time machine (would that we all) I would certainly change the word “muted” at the very least. Nothing that has provoked this much discussion could be called that.
I appreciate where you are coming from and thank you for taking the time to discuss your work. I very much look forward to what comes next.
Take Care,
Bryce
In response to inRetro: inSide Books, Shock Value by Jason Zinoman
Jason Zinoman posted on August 16, 2011
I never said horror people voted unanimously. I said your characterization that horror fans’s response was muted at best, hostile at worst is wrong. Then i gave you evidence to back it up. I never called you malicious or questioned your professionalism or said you were raining on my parade. What can i saw, Bryce? I just didn’t do that. Frankly, i find your response awfully defensive. Where we disagree is that you think your statement that the response from horror folk was hostile or muted is founded and supported with sufficient evidence. I don’t. And i wonder if the new evidence i presented has changed your mind at all.
I do agree that my book does mix reporting and criticism, and while i think you engaged with it on the latter, what i tried to do here is try and clarify my intentions with the former. The rest of your criticisms i appreciate, i really do. I respect your opinion, and the more criticism and debate, the better. And now, im afraid, a deadline looms so must go finish a review. All the best, jz
In response to inRetro: inSide Books, Shock Value by Jason Zinoman
Bryce Wilson posted on August 16, 2011
That said I look forward to reading The Naked And The Undead as soon as possible. And will take the opportunity to tip my hat to one horror scholar I forgot to mention, Tim Brayton of the superlative Antagony & Ecstasy.
In response to inRetro: inSide Books, Shock Value by Jason Zinoman
Bryce Wilson posted on August 16, 2011
Jason you’re telling me that Horror fans and press are a diverse group with wildly divergent opinions, all of which voted in a unanimously positive block. I’m sorry but those are two contradictory arguments. Though I have to admit that characterizing the dissenting opinion as “a few of my friends” rankles. I can assure you that I wasn’t hanging out with some buddies behind a theater before turning to one and saying “I’m going to screw up Zinoman’s parade!” I gauged the opinions of the horror community based on the reviews I encountered and the opinions I heard expressed by horror fans and called it like I saw it. You can of course disagree with what I said, and as I already conceded there have been plenty of positive reviews. But there was nothing malicious in my approach, and as I already pointed out it’s not like I just made these reviews and opinions up. I gave quotes and cited sources, so questioning my professionalism seems a bit uncalled for.
As for the pre ’68 Horror, I think you walk the line between reportage and criticism in it. Sometimes it’s the filmmakers but just as often you are clearly giving your own opinion. Which obviously you have the right to it’s your book. As well as the right to “defend it to the death.” if you so choose. Just as I have the right to say that the films are more sophisticated, both stylistically and thematically, than you give them credit for and that your book talks about them in generalizations that I feel are unwarranted. As you said, not talking about something is not the same as denigrating them but there are such things as sins of omission and I believe that your book commits a few. I have to say I was particularly surprised to find no mention of The Witchfinder General in the text, as it was as sure a work of new horror as has been made, but made entirely from “Old Horror” Iconography. Especially as it starred Vincent Price, who you present as the standard bearer for musty Old Horror. How’s that for world’s colliding?
There were other things as well, like when you’re listing off the old horror stars who were dying at the end of the sixties, and included Lon Chaney. Who died in 1930. I’m presuming this was a typo and you were referring to Lon Chaney Jr., but he joined the choir invisible in 1973, some half decade after the time period you were referencing. It was omissions and generalizations such as these that I felt hurt the text, not just your opinion.
Like I said, I certainly do respect the work you put into this, I gave the book a hearty thumbs up as a work of film history and a discussion starter. And I certainly can’t argue with results. But my complaints were neither unfounded or unsupported.
In response to inRetro: inSide Books, Shock Value by Jason Zinoman
Jason Zinoman posted on August 16, 2011
Bryce,
I am not going to deny that i love the horror films from this era more than any other. I do and as a grumbling, not-at-all boosterish horror fan, that’s my right to stake an opinionated claim and then defend it to the death. But where i think you misunderstand me is that this book began not as a work of criticism, but as a work of reporting informed by a critical point of view. And what i discovered from talking to the directors of this period is that THEY saw the Old Horror as campy and not scary and out of date. And that THEY made movies in reaction to Vincent Price and Hammer. Some of them also loved those movies, but when i talk about what karloff represented to Peter B, my main goal is to try to explain how they movies got made the way they did. And my opinion, based on talking to directors, is that they set out to do something new and take horror in a different direction. To properly understand that shift, i wanted to map what they viewed as the horror scene then. That’s more important than what i think, because i didn’t make Last House on the Left. Craven did. Now maybe he isn’t the best critic of his own work, but i think on the ground reporting is a valuable tool to understanding the genre. That said, do i think that Alien and Texas Chainsaw Massacre are scarier than Freaks? Do i think Last House is more unsettling? Yes and yes. You can disagree and we can battle it out. As i say in the book, fear is as subjective as beauty.
As for horror fans, i know what you’re saying and i probably felt the same way before writing this book and reading reviews. But what i have found by reading scores of sites and magazine is a tremendous diversity of opinion and far deeper thinking than what i found in the major paper reviews. I also think the distinction between horror and nonhorror is not so clear. Glenn kenny may be a horror fan but he reviews everything. Laura Miller is a book critic for Salon but she is as smart about horror as anyone, and her review of my book, which includes praise and criticism, demonstrates that. The fact that Stacie Ponder (whose work i admire) and a few other of your friends didn’t like the book only proves my point. If you google search reviews, you will find that your characterization of the horror press’s response is straight-up wrong, no question about it. That doesn’t mean some people didn’t hate the book. They did. But as someone who loves a good critical spat, i wouldn’t have it any other way.
Add to your reading list Cynthia Freeland’s The Naked and the Undead, the best academic book on horror i’ve read in a long time. best, jason
In response to inRetro: inSide Books, Shock Value by Jason Zinoman
Bryce Wilson posted on August 16, 2011
…And Joe Bob Briggs.
In response to inRetro: inSide Books, Shock Value by Jason Zinoman
Bryce Wilson posted on August 16, 2011
And while I’m tipping my hat to my must read writers on the Horror Genre better mention Tim Lucas, Kim Newman, Bill Ryan’s “31 Days Of Slash” and of course Stephen King’s Danse Macabre. All essential reading for any horror fan.
In response to inRetro: inSide Books, Shock Value by Jason Zinoman
Bryce Wilson posted on August 16, 2011
Jason,
I can certainly understand what you are saying and you make good points.
First though I want to say that I have to stand by what I say about the bias the book takes against Pre ’68 Horror films. You’re absolutely correct that omitting the study of films and filmmakers alone wouldn’t be denigration but as your thesis tends to describe “old horror” in terms of camp and gimmicks, as kids stuff. With phrases like “Karloff represented the cobwebs of a spooky castle, cheap advertising campaigns, the lurching monster-in other words old horror.” And “Romero mocks the conventions of the Old Horror movie as betraying any sense of reality.” You are criticizing the films implicitly if not explicitly and in a way I simply felt wasn’t accurate. I bet most people today would find Freaks tougher watch than Last House On The Left (Which I think Stephen King summed up nicely as “Abbot And Costello Meet The Rapists”.) And I think Val Lewton certainly made more than “modest Freudian films.”
That said, I can certainly understand your position on the auteur theory, and of course with the extensive research you’ve done you’re more than earned it. It’s just the sudden right turn that was taken at the DePalma chapter that through me. As I will admit it is mostly the Hitchcock material that inspired “The Couch” comment. (
As for the reviews, it is true that I made my comment based mostly on dialogue with other horror fans. I try to keep up with as much horror literature as I can (My go to girl on that front remains Stacie Ponder, with a side of Drew McWeeney, and some Scott Weinberg as well.) but I will cite Bill Ryan, and the afore mentioned Glenn Kenny, just to demonstrate what I’m saying isn’t unfounded. I would go ahead and add The Deadly Doll’s House Of Horror Nonsense to your list of popular reviews. In hindsight mixed would be a more appropriate word than muted. Though I think I said what I meant to the first time out which was merely “curious” and in reference as much to the positive response by the mainstream.
That said, I will also stand by my comment that horror fans are a booster happy bunch. As I meant it as a sincere compliment. What other group of fandom is more or less self sustaining? Just look at “Before The Mask’s” Facebook Page, I’ve seen horror fans rally around something they really love too many times for it to be otherwise. They might not always succeed (The swift retraction of Hatchet II from AMC theaters springs to mind) but they always give it their best shot. If Attack The Block goes nation wide it will be because of them. There’s a lot of truth in this Faracci article (http://www.chud.com/19627/chud-quick-list-6-reasons-why-horror-fans-make-the-best-film-fans/
Anyway I certainly have an enormous amount of respect for what you’ve accomplished, the amount of work you put into it and your passion. I was sincere when I made the compliment about starting a dialogue with people who usually wouldn’t. If we disagree in a some key places in our understanding of the genre that’s natural. Hopefully you understand the spirit of debate it is intended in.
All The Best,
Bryce
In response to inRetro: inSide Books, Shock Value by Jason Zinoman
David posted on August 15, 2011
Very Strong.
In response to inTouch: The Help Stirs the Pot and Fosters Dialogue
Jason Zinoman posted on August 15, 2011
Bryce,
I liked your list of five movies I did not mention in Shock Value – every one worthy of its own book. And I’m not sure why you think I am denigrating film-makers who I don’t mention. The book is not a survey of horror movies in the 20th century. It’s a reported book ( i sure tried to have every interview for an extended period of time although it was usually in chairs, not couches) about a discrete period in horror that I do believe was a golden age, but that does not mean i don’t believe that great horror wasn’t made before or after. As for the auteur theory, to clarify: I find it useful, but through my reporting, I came to the conclusion that these movies were often much more works of collaboration than they have been given credit for.
But what’s most strange is your assertion that the response among horror fans has been muted or hostile. We could compare what we’ve heard from friends and movie people but that’s silly. This is a book that has received dozens of reviews, most of them from the horror press. You don’t mention any of them. So the evidence is easy to find. Check out Fangoria or Bloody Disgusting or Freddy in Space or Monsterland or Retro Slashers or any of the many, many others (Shock Value FB page has close to them all). I disagree with you that they are a “notoriously booster happy bunch.” I have been hugely impressed by the quality of thought and prose of the reviews from the horror press. You would benefit from taking a look.
Best, Jason Zinoman
In response to inRetro: inSide Books, Shock Value by Jason Zinoman
Drew posted on August 15, 2011
I did really like Jude the Obscure though. And Claire Tomlin’s Hardy bio. Elif is right, I guess.
In response to inTouch: Not Loving the Classics
Drew posted on August 15, 2011
A Confederacy of Dunces. That book is outrageously overrated.
In response to inTouch: Not Loving the Classics
Cynthia posted on August 15, 2011
I’m one of those rare people who doesn’t love Stephen King, except for Salem’s Lot. I’m a vampire fan and I saw the TV movie which led me to the book many years ago. It features an excellent cast of characters and really brings the vampire myth into everyday life. Can’t say I’m crazy about the current cover of the book though, what’s that all about?
In response to ‘Salem’s lot
Jada Bradley posted on August 15, 2011
I’ve read a few of them and some deserve the praise, but I can’t recommend all of those that I’ve read. Interesting if you enjoyed Catcher in the Rye, unassigned. Let us know if Catcher still appeals to you years later.
In response to inTouch: Not Loving the Classics
Becca posted on August 15, 2011
I don’t think I’ve read any of the “overrated” classics, other than Catcher in the Rye. I enjoyed it in high school, though I don’t believe I had to read it for a class. I may have, I just have a bad memory. But now that it’s gotten so much flack, I think I have to read it again.
In response to inTouch: Not Loving the Classics
Gia Manry posted on August 15, 2011
I know a guy who works with eBooks at B&N and who I also know to be a comics fan; if I get the opportunity I guess I’ll try to ask him!
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: (Not) Reading Comics on the Nook
Jon posted on August 14, 2011
Great interview. Had no idea about this imprint. Good to know…
In response to Hard Case Crime: Atavism as a Labor of Love
Bryce Wilson posted on August 11, 2011
That’s an excellent point. That being said having read the second book, it makes Grossman’s structure make a bit more sense. And I will confirm that the sequel is an immense improvement.
In response to Cult Beat: The Magicians by Lev Grossman
Bryce Wilson posted on August 11, 2011
@ Alex: It’s not so much that I refuse to take a chance on self published stuff. I’ve heard great things about Maps And Legends and am hoping to try it out. It’s just a matter of time.
That said, I think even this has problems. The graphic novel section on the Nook Bookstore is a mess, same kind of shovel ware problem. It’s almost impossible to browse with all the detritus that ends up in there. And the nook is just too small to read comics on without the benefit of pinch and pull. I tried downloading The Oatmeal’s book on there and it was it literally unreadable.
@ Gia: Well Barnes And Noble has been making a point to do everything in house. So I’m not that surprised they didn’t go with comixology. It’d just be nice if someone in said house had a clue about what they were trying to do.
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: (Not) Reading Comics on the Nook
Greg Russo posted on August 11, 2011
I declare this to be awesome and I want it on my Droid.
In response to Paramecia: Humans’ New Gaming Buddies?
Gia Manry posted on August 11, 2011
With regards to yaoi, it’s sad, but for the most part that’s the only genre that’s heavily embraced digital release. A few publishers in the U.S. are now working with iOS releases (Yen Press, Viz Media), but that’s about it, and probably is legitimately not Nook/B&N’s fault.
But for American comics? No clue why they wouldn’t go with ComiXology.
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: (Not) Reading Comics on the Nook
Alex de Campi posted on August 11, 2011
Bryce, a shame you’re not willing to take a chance on the self-published stuff. In Maps & Legends is WONDERFUL and is doing really well on the Nook, and I also have VALENTINE in ePub form in three languages. The Nook is actually incredibly easy to publish on…
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: (Not) Reading Comics on the Nook
Behemoth posted on August 11, 2011
I liked this book quite a bit, although I agree that it seemed underdone and overstuffed at times. I remember thinking when I first read it that it was the rare fantasy novel that should have been longer or even broken up into more books (it features three pretty distinct acts and I think would have played well as a trilogy). That said, I haven’t read the sequel yet, which I’ve heard good things about, so maybe some of the first book’s problems are due to set-up he wanted to get out of the way quickly.
In response to Cult Beat: The Magicians by Lev Grossman
télévision streaming posted on August 11, 2011
Cool gizmo, is it easy to use?
In response to Taking the Espresso Book Machine for a Test Drive
Drew posted on August 10, 2011
You just need to think more fractally.
In response to inSide Books: Supergods by Grant Morrison
Budd posted on August 10, 2011
I didn’t like this book at all.
In response to Cult Beat: The Magicians by Lev Grossman
Bryce Wilson posted on August 10, 2011
Nicely done.
I’m still not sure what happened in Final Crisis though.
In response to inSide Books: Supergods by Grant Morrison
Bryce Wilson posted on August 10, 2011
Obviously I cannot speak for Mr. Grossman, but I would be pretty psyched if my work inspired someone to pick up a warhammer.
Hell I might be tempted to use your quote on the cover.
In response to Cult Beat: The Magicians by Lev Grossman
Drew posted on August 9, 2011
I agree with your friend. This book made me want to take a warhammer to something breakable. Good piece, though.
In response to Cult Beat: The Magicians by Lev Grossman
Wendy posted on August 7, 2011
@Christian – this was before your time at inReads, but take a minute to check out this incredibly artistic interpretation of an e-reader: http://www.inreads.com/blog/2011/06/01/intouch-the-kindle-unplugged/
In response to E-Reader Reality Check: 4 Limitations to Consider
Christian Harder posted on August 6, 2011
@ASRAI: I accounted for the fact that “the average reader doesn’t give a damn about [presentation]“. I think it’s unfortunate that we don’t respect a work of literature as a holistic presentation rather than something that can just be converted into data, but that’s another post.
“Cheaper book costs, means cheaper books, means more buyers.” You’ve just reduced literature to a numbers game. Unless you’re a fledgling publisher, I won’t tell you how depressed that makes me.
@WILLIAM SCOTT It was a bit of both. Theorists–smarter than any of us–posit that the book-qua-art exists as the ENTIRE presentation; not just the text. It’s referenced by a philosophy called ‘Essentialism’. What depresses me is that the reading public forcefully eschews this artistic product in favor of easily digestible e-ink. There exists no art in the world that can be converted onto a new medium and still be considered art. A picture you see on your computer of a painting is not art, but a representation of art. The same goes for a book.
The difference is, however, that people don’t seem to consider the ‘book’, art. If we had “e-versions” of an art gallery, no one would argue the Rembrants were the same quality of art on the device. It’s a cheap facsimile! The fact that the same discussion isn’t being held about e-readers more frequently is shocking.
You aren’t technically “losing too much” in terms of information on the e-reader. However, simply making this designation admits that you’re only concerned about information, and not the art. E-readers, syllogistically, reduce art to information. The words are still there, but as any literary theorist will tell you, the art is not.
In response to E-Reader Reality Check: 4 Limitations to Consider
Chris Bennor posted on August 5, 2011
Hit up the young adult section of your local library. If you haven’t read the Hunger Games trilogy, City of Glass or one of the many other series/books out there you’re missing out. And while you’re at it, go ahead and reread Jane Eyre or Little Women or Where the Red Fern Grows. Kid/YA fiction is lovely.
In response to The Anti-Summer Reading List
Donna posted on August 4, 2011
I’ll have to say Paris; every time I read about my favorite authors there is mention of their time in that city and how she helped them evolve into the writer they were meant to be….
In response to Conversation of the Week: Literary Cities
William Scott posted on August 3, 2011
“Of course, this should only worry readers who care about art.”
I can’t tell if this is derogatory or just a statement. When you say “art” do you mean the visual art that accompanies a given book, or are you saying that readers who aren’t afraid of giving up typography and all that just don’t care about art?
In any case, this point was the only one that really holds any weight with me, but still not much. There are certainly books such as House of Leaves that would lose all their power and effectiveness on an e-reader. However, I can’t say I imagine losing too much reading Animal Farm, Infinite Jest, or even The Great Gatsby digitally. Those books would be all about the content to me. Not to mention most books go through so many revisions and reprints by new publishers and new editions that any original typographical, layout, or cover design choices may have accompanied the author’s original work get completely lost over time.
I don’t know, I’m an eighteen year-old who absolutely loves reading, so I’m already an anomaly, but I can’t bring myself to get up in arms about e-readers being the death of reading (not that I think this article is saying that). I have enough faith that books that should be printed in physical form will continue to be printed in physical form. As for the rest, well, they’ll all be on my Kindle, whether I get around to reading them before 500 years is up or not.
Hope this wasn’t too negative. This was a well thought out and written article, I just don’t agree with it. (Civil discussion on the internet?)
In response to E-Reader Reality Check: 4 Limitations to Consider
Bryce Wilson posted on August 3, 2011
I really don’t think there’s any other contender than Berkley in America. There’s a book shop on every block. Literally. Powell’s alone would be enough to earn it the title.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Literary Cities
asrai posted on August 3, 2011
The 30% of Americans who do read 15+ books a year is nothing to sneeze at. Konrath sells 30,000 books a month by pricing at 2.99. If more books are priced at 2.99 on Amazon, more people will read more books. Few people read 3000 books in their lifetime, but many will buy 3,000 books in their life.
3. Please. The average reader doesn’t give a damn about typography or how pretty the book looks on paper. All it does is inflate the cost of the book, cheaper book costs, means cheaper books, means more buyers.
In response to E-Reader Reality Check: 4 Limitations to Consider
Kama posted on August 3, 2011
I run a book club – it’s relatively new, we only have a couple of meetings under our belt – and there are only two of us who use an e-Reader so far. One person I mentioned the group to asked if we could use an eReader (I don’t know why she thought I would care).
I imagine we may see more adoption. It’s awfully convenient that in addition to reading on my eReader, I’m able to pick up where I left off on my phone with one hand, and use the other for a handhold while I’m commuting.
In response to inTouch: Are Book Clubs Adopting More E-Books?
Jada Bradley posted on August 3, 2011
I loved SMILE so much I was reluctant to part with it and give it to my niece. (I bought it for her but had to read it first to make sure it was okay.)
In response to The Autobiographical Comic: Some Recommendations
Bryce Wilson posted on August 2, 2011
@ Meg: Funnily enough thanks to the ease of the notation and book marking advice I tend to buy E-Books if I know I’ll have to flip back and forth.
@ S.: Glad to know that there’s someone else on my wavelength. Hope you’ll stick with the column!
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: A New inReads Column
Bryce Wilson posted on August 2, 2011
Hope you do leopard: I recommend Iron West and Creature Tech for starters.
In response to Doug TenNapel: A Graphic Novelist of “Extraordinary Depth and Imagination”
Bryce Wilson posted on August 2, 2011
@ Jane: I want to read more of the Scudder and Rhodenbarr books. I’ve only sampled a couple from each series. But that’s the great thing about Crime Fiction there’s always more.
That said, John Dortmunder will most likely always be my man for Comic Crime Books. Poor poor man.
@ Marty: Strong words.
In response to Cult Beat: Hit Man by Lawrence Block
Marty Clark posted on August 2, 2011
Add me to the cult. Keller is a toss up with Harry Angstrom and Raskolnikov for me as memorable literary characters go.
In response to Cult Beat: Hit Man by Lawrence Block
Jane Sprouse posted on August 2, 2011
Correction: I love love love the Hit Man books. I have recommended them to all my friends who read and many who don’t but certainly oughta! I was the died in the WOOL Matthew Scudder fan until I found Bernie Rhodenbarr and then wham! I found Hit Man. Now I am reading A Touch of the Hard Stuff. LB is a fine wine and just keeps on getting better with age.
In response to Cult Beat: Hit Man by Lawrence Block
Jane Sprouse posted on August 2, 2011
I love love love the Hit Man books. I have recommended them to all my friends who read and many who don’t but certainly oughta! I was the died in the wall Matthew Scudder fan until I found Bernie Rhodenbarr and then wham! I found Hit Man. Now I am reading A Touch of the Hard Stuff. LB is a fine wine and just keeps on getting better with age.
In response to Cult Beat: Hit Man by Lawrence Block
le0pard13 posted on August 1, 2011
Great interview, Bryce. I need to check out more of Doug TenNapel’s work. Thanks.
In response to Doug TenNapel: A Graphic Novelist of “Extraordinary Depth and Imagination”
G.Franklin Prue posted on July 31, 2011
My favorite author is Thomas, McGuane. His writing is simple, clear and a reflection of a glass of water half
full. This author gave me the courage to write, and keep it simple, but with my own style of poetic nuance. I have become a brave Writer, not afraid to fail on the desolate plains of getting my novels published.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Who’s Your Literary Crush?
S. McHayle posted on July 31, 2011
Lestat de Lioncourt from the Anne Rice Vampire Chronicles
Ooh now THERE is real vampire. Sexy and sensual, utterly evil, yet able to fall in love with music,and art. He makes you want to just offer your neck and join him in eternity.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Who’s Your Literary Crush?
S. McHayle posted on July 31, 2011
I can identify with this. I remember scoffing at e-readers because I love actual books. However I have a small apartment with space for only one shelf (sniff) and can only keep my faves. I also ended up happily buying a book only to discover by the 4th chapter that I’d read some time in the past. I finally caved and bought a Kindle 3. So now I’m a happy, not ecstatic
Kindle owner and can read to my heart’s content without worrying about clutter or a double purchase. If I love a book enough I get it in print. I think that’s a good arrangement.
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: A New inReads Column
Ron Mexico posted on July 30, 2011
Bravo Kathie! Very well done
In response to You’ve Come A Long Way, J.K. Rowling. Happy Birthday.
Raymond posted on July 29, 2011
One of favorite books of poetry. I wish I could get it in electronic form to carry with me.
In response to New and Collected Poems 1931-2001
Liz posted on July 28, 2011
Great piece! I always enjoy Jon’s articles. This is so informative for all writers, established and aspiring.
I especially like the last point, about bringing networking back into real time, because I think that’s so important. And it leads me to the question I wanted to pose, as a devil’s advocate. What if you’re a writer and you really don’t want to tweet, and blog, and use Facebook to engage with your readers? Can an emerging writer refuse to do these things and still get picked up by a publisher and build an audience? Or is the way to go to find a recently graduated English major to ghostwrite your blog and twitter feed?
In response to DIY: Expanding Your Online Presence
Meg W. posted on July 28, 2011
I’m not a big fan of e-readers. There is nothing that can replace the feel of an actual book in my hands. I try to limit my e-reading to books that I know that I’m not going to want to or have to flip back and forth in. That’s too hard to do with an e-reader.
In response to Diary of a Reluctant E-Reader: A New inReads Column
Bryce Wilson posted on July 28, 2011
I appreciate the vote of confidence.
Dark Knight Returns will definitely get its own entry. I consider it one of the finest pieces of pulp written.
In response to Cult Beat: A New inReads Column
Kari Young posted on July 27, 2011
I read and write YA so fortunately my crushes don’t transfer to real life as I am over 18. That said. . . my current lit crush is Etienne St. Clair from Anna and the French Kiss but I will always have spots in my heart for Mr. Darcy and Rochester. I know cliche’.
My friend has the best, she read a biography on Abraham Lincoln and now refers to him as “Baberham”.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Who’s Your Literary Crush?
Kari Young posted on July 27, 2011
Excited about this new column and a nod to both civil war reenactments and The Dark Knight Returns means that your opinions don’t suck.
In response to Cult Beat: A New inReads Column
Wendy posted on July 27, 2011
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/04/15/60minutes/main20054397.shtml
Krakauer appeared on the 60 Minutes piece, so it could seem collaborative, but his efforts were only one piece of the aired story.
In response to inTouch: Instant E-pubs Are Changing Journalism
Jada Bradley posted on July 27, 2011
I too like finding those “diamonds in the rough.” Those books have a different kind of shine than books on the bestseller lists.
In response to inTouch: Limit the Bestseller List?
Dave Cullen posted on July 27, 2011
Very interesting stuff.
If I recall the Krakauer situation correctly, though, I think the take on it here is misleading. I thought Krakauer was actually collaborating with 60 Minutes on the story. Is that wrong?
(And if that’s the case, he wasn’t just able to race to get it out quickly after the show, he and 60 Minutes timed them for near-simultaneous release.)
In response to inTouch: Instant E-pubs Are Changing Journalism
William Scott posted on July 26, 2011
This sounds like something I would enjoy immensely, yet I’ve somehow never heard of it. This is going right to the top of my “to read” list. Great article/feature idea.
In response to Cult Beat: The Master and Margarita
Bryce Wilson posted on July 26, 2011
I have to admit that I fell pretty hard for Kim Pine in Bryan Lee O’Malley’s Scott Pilgrim books (I have a thing for sardonic freckled red heads).
My real crush would have to be on the not entirely fictional Sara Vowell though. Also in the crushes on girl’s much smarter and more talented than I, I have to admit she may have been recently supplanted by Kate Beaton.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Who’s Your Literary Crush?
Maxine Frendel posted on July 26, 2011
This is really interesting. I’ve never really consulted an author’s bestseller list-status before choosing what to read before, and I don’t plan on starting now. I like finding those “diamond in the rough” novels…it’s very satisfying!
In response to inTouch: Limit the Bestseller List?
Maxine Frendel posted on July 26, 2011
As a writer, I never really considered doing an ebook before I learned of your choice to do so. Now I think it’s a great idea! I’m reading your book now and I can really see the “heart and soul” you mentioned. Great job!
In response to Reconciling My E-Book
Nicole posted on July 26, 2011
This is the first that I am hearing of Thomas Harriot, bet he sounds like a fascinating historical figure. I am curious to see what the historical record will reflect about him since this is a fictional portrayal.
In response to The School of Night, A Novel
Nigel Ewels posted on July 25, 2011
Nice story peeper.
In response to inRetrospect: Finding Raymond Chandler
Dianne posted on July 25, 2011
I totally see the crush on Stuart from “the Help.” I’m curious who’s playing him in the movie. He’s really kind of a sleazy character because he’s so hot and cold towards Skeeter and Skeeter is such a likable character, but there were times that he was sweet and the reader could totally get a little crush on him.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Who’s Your Literary Crush?
Liz posted on July 25, 2011
I love this!
I’m not sure whether this is off-topic, given that I’m referencing “Harry Potter” the movie here, instead of the books, but I love Harry Potter as a character whether he’s on the page or on the screen.
So yesterday my friends and I went over to my parents’ house to use their pool and in the evening we were sunburnt and hanging out in their living room and my mom shouts, “Liz, turn on the TV to ABC Family real quick!” So I turn it on and it’s the scene in “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire” where Harry is finishing the second round in the competition where they have to save their friends from the bottom of the lake at Hogwarts and Harry flies out of the water and he lands, breathless, on the dock in his swimsuit.
My mom knows that I like that part, because it’s the movie where Harry has finally grown leg hair and you get to see his bare legs. I was 17 when that movie first came out (6 years ago) and I remember catcalling the screen in the movie theater and people laughing, but I like to lay claims to the fact that I thought HP was hot before anyone else did. And I remember being attracted to Harry when I was 11, before the movies came out or the books were even phenomenally popular.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Who’s Your Literary Crush?
California posted on July 25, 2011
Sounds like fun, who will you look for next?
In response to inRetrospect: Finding Raymond Chandler
Tal posted on July 21, 2011
We should all be so lucky!!
In response to inAuthors: Melissa Fay Greene Riffs on Five Books, Nine Children
Jada Bradley posted on July 21, 2011
Interesting…I’ve seen those themes (tragic mulatto, descent into madness or near madness) in her other work.
In response to inSide Books: Racial Preoccupation in Danzy Senna’s You Are Free
Jada Bradley posted on July 20, 2011
Becca-Reading a (paper) book is a very tactile experience and e-readers can’t replicate that. And I too have found some gems in the Borders clearance section.
Janet-I didn’t realized they were so flexible with seniors. That makes it even more of a loss.
In response to inTouch: Saying Goodbye to Borders is Mostly Bitter
janet garber posted on July 20, 2011
What’s tragic is that Border’s was a well-known employer of seniors, often letting them work part time (with benefits) in NY and then in FLA where they spent the winters.
In response to inTouch: Saying Goodbye to Borders is Mostly Bitter
Becca posted on July 20, 2011
The biggest loss to me is the ability to browse. To read the back and the first page to see how a book feels. To find new authors in the clearance or bogo section and spend months reading their other works. This just doesn’t happen online, I’ve tried. I guess I’ll do my browsing at B&N and my buying on Amazon now.
In response to inTouch: Saying Goodbye to Borders is Mostly Bitter
Shan harry posted on July 20, 2011
Great post on QR codes. As new technology are been booming new things get raise up. Check out new technology on top exchange resources
In response to inTouch: QR Codes Deliver Reads in an Instant
inReads posted on July 19, 2011
Sounds bad!
In response to From Self-Help Book to Scripted Movie
Brian posted on July 18, 2011
I’ve never read the books or seen any of the movies but it got kids reading again, interested in books. Although I can’t appreciate ebook readers like Kindle or Nook, it sparked an interest in creative expression and acceptance that there can only be more of.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Harry Potter, Harry Potter, and More Harry Potter
David posted on July 15, 2011
That “Who Moved My Cheese?” animated movie actually exists. I had to watch it during a work seminar. It was bad.
In response to From Self-Help Book to Scripted Movie
Liz posted on July 15, 2011
Oh my God, you’ve never read the Harry Potter books? You can’t begin to imagine what you’re missing–they’re a delight!
In response to inTouch: Have We Really Seen the Last of Harry Potter?
Kari Young posted on July 15, 2011
I like Dystopian novels. Societies gone wrong and the only ones who can fight are the young because they still have hope. I’m a sucker for this plot, it gets me every time.
But I’m tired of the love triangle. Yes this book has one. I’m not sure why this is but, apparently, in the future all boys love the same girl. You know that girl who’s too tough to show emotion but always manages to fall hopelessly in love with two boys (of course one’s blond and the other brunette).
I’m going to go out on a limb here and say if people today are having difficulty getting together than I’m not so sure oppressed future societies would have a bunch love triangles. It’s not the Love Boat they’re on, these kids are fighting for their lives.
In response to Possession
Drew posted on July 14, 2011
Trumpet of the Swan is one of my favorites. Still remember Mrs. Johnson reading that to us in first grade.
In response to Conversation of the Week: Childhood Authors We Love
Drew posted on July 14, 2011
I will check this fellow out. Love Everett and liked Big Machine. Nice q+a.
In response to Interview with Mat Johnson, “a novelist who sometimes writes other things”
Liz posted on July 13, 2011
Eek! I haven’t read this book, but at first glance, I have to disagree– this description sounds like this book cheapens the 1920s. My perception of the 20s, with all its excess and drinking and sex (and womanizing) and jazz is that it was still a literary and very creative time, and I hate to see it GossipGirl-ified, as in, there’s money but it’s cheap. Actually, it sounds more like Pretty Little Liars, which is worse.
I’ll have to read it to have an educated opinion, but I’d much rather see historical YA fiction that doesn’t dumb things down with scandal–I think it would take a more creative author to make YA fiction that speaks for itself, with more substance and less scandal.
In response to ourReads: Vixen by Jillian Larson
Amanda posted on July 13, 2011
Liz! This is a fantastic piece! I’m definitely sharing
In response to What to Do if the Media Career You Wanted Doesn’t Exist
Shari Lopatin posted on July 12, 2011
Well, she’s not exactly a CHILDREN’s author, but she’s a young adult author.
JUDY BLUME.
My first favorite chapter book was “Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing.” And then “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” Judy helped shape my love for reading and writing. Today, I’m a former newspaper reporter, professional writer of several forms (corporate, creative, script, and editorial). Thanks Judy Blume!
In response to Conversation of the Week: Childhood Authors We Love
Liz posted on July 11, 2011
As an author, I hate amazon reviews. Sometimes it feels like amazon is juicycampus for authors, where people can come and rant and write often cruel reviews–anonymously, of course. And there seems to be some kind of trend that when a book has upwards of 200 amazon reviews, their average star-rating goes down, usually around 3 stars, because presumably when a book gets popular, the naysayers feel more inclined to rip it online (still anonymously). Not a fan.
I think I pay the most attention to author blurbs, like Oh, Curtis Sittenfeld blurbed this! Or, Oh, Augusten Burroughs blurbed this. This isn’t a fool-proof system for finding good books (I recently read an Augusten Burroughs-blurbed book that wasn’t good at all), but I consider the opinions of published authors much more heavily than I consider the opinions of anonymous amazon reviewers (who could be bitter Brown University juniors or bored assistants in LA).
In response to inTouch: Are Amazon Customer Reviews Biased? Do We Care?
Jada Bradley posted on July 11, 2011
I don’t tend to read Amazon reviews either, but I think some of the people that do are unaware of what goes on “behind the music.”
In response to inTouch: Are Amazon Customer Reviews Biased? Do We Care?
Meg @ A Bookish Affair posted on July 11, 2011
I do a mix of all of the above. I do like when I get suggestions from other readers but I’ve also been known to browse for a couple hours in a book store to pick up something that catches my eye. As a book blogger, I think that reviews from my peers are helpful, especially once I find someone that has similar reading tastes to me. I’ve also found a lot of books that I wouldn’t normally pick up through other book bloggers. Admittedly, I don’t typically read Amazon reviews. When I go to Amazon, I usually already know the book that I’m looking for!
In response to inTouch: Are Amazon Customer Reviews Biased? Do We Care?
Jada Bradley posted on July 8, 2011
You make a good point about the format–it does take some adjustment, but it’s well worth it.
In response to inTouch: Want a Read with Drama? Try a Play.
Kari Young posted on July 8, 2011
I love that you included a YA novel and I’m adding The Last Werewolf to my TBR list.
In response to Move Over, Beach Reads: 5 Sci-Fi & Fantasy Novels for the Summer
Drew posted on July 8, 2011
Nice list. Man I hated The Magicians, though.
In response to Move Over, Beach Reads: 5 Sci-Fi & Fantasy Novels for the Summer
Andrew.Toal posted on July 8, 2011
Thanks Sara. I thought about including a photo of myself face down at a bar as another helpful aid, but then thought that might be too much info. Glad you liked it.
In response to inComparison: Ex-Pat Novels
Sam posted on July 7, 2011
I want a typewriter so badly! Whenever I see one in a consignment shop, I’m always so tempted to buy it… I’m not sure that I’d use it–it would be purely decorative.
In response to inRetrospect: Without the Typewriter…?
Cara posted on July 7, 2011
Midnight in Paris = Major Oscar bait. I have no doubt that it will nab a “Best Picture” nomination and it probably has a good shot at winning.
In response to Woody Allen & Baz Luhrmann Make F. Scott Fitzgerald Cool Again
Jenna posted on July 7, 2011
Kate Oczypok is probably my favorite inReads’ writer. Her writing style is so lively and fun–I want to see more from her!
In response to Woody Allen & Baz Luhrmann Make F. Scott Fitzgerald Cool Again
Andie posted on July 7, 2011
This is so interesting! I did some googling and found lots of great press for the Poetry Brothel, but I also found some feminist blogs that really took issue with the Poetry Brothel’s presumed romanticism of prostitution in turn of the century New York (because late 1800s/early 1900s-era sex workers probably turned tricks out of financial desperation, or worse yet, without a say in the matter at all). I can see the detractors’ point, but I think what the Poetry Brothel is doing is so important, breathing life into poetry and making poetry relevant–and sexy!–for a younger audience.
I’m wondering what it’s like when you have a pet project and people really come after what you’re doing with claws bared. I’d be so curious to hear how Lisa and the other poets reacted and coped.
In response to Poetry Meets the World’s Oldest Profession
Sam posted on July 7, 2011
I got really into reading plays when I lived in New York. The formatting can be hard to read–you have to get used to the fact that it’s not like reading a book and you need to retrain your brain a bit–but it’s totally worth it. I really like the “Spring Awakening” play and “Equus” is one of my favorites (got into “Equus” after seeing Daniel Radcliffe in the show on Broadway in 2008).
In response to inTouch: Want a Read with Drama? Try a Play.
Alex posted on July 7, 2011
As a writer, I completely agree. I have no problem writing non-fiction and journalism, but when I try fiction, I feel self-conscious and extremely critical of my writing… not to mention paranoid about what other people will say about it and think about it. I don’t think Keli Goff is being hyperbolic at all–I commend her for being so honest!
In response to inAuthors: Keli Goff Riffs on Why Writing Fiction is More Terrifying than Jumping out of an Airplane
Sara posted on July 7, 2011
Ha–I love the way you’ve broken this down! This is a fun article but the visual appeal makes it even better. Would love to see more of this.
In response to inComparison: Ex-Pat Novels
thebookie posted on July 7, 2011
http://www.thecopia.com sent me an email. They are giving away ebook copies of Alexander Dumas The Borgias, which was apparently source material for the Showtime series. this piqued my interest. Who knew that M. Dumas was the Gawker/TMZ of his time, devoting his his time to a series called Celebrated Crimes? Apparently, he was a devoted gossip — spewing hearsay and innuendo. I look forward to reading my free copy.
Nayana Currimbhoy posted on July 6, 2011
Love it love it love it! Your review pulls out all my little secret references, delighted that you picked so many, and you kept my favorite for the end – I had most fun with Atlas Shrugged inside History of British Rule in India! I changed the name of that novel so many times! Thank you so much Jada, you made my day!
In response to inSide Books: The Literature in Miss Timmins’ School for Girls
Tamye posted on July 6, 2011
Awesome book by a talented Canadian author. Can’t wait for her next book.
In response to Room, a novel
Kim posted on July 6, 2011
50 FIRST DATES meets MEMENTO in book form. Gripping at first, I had this one figured out before I was half into it. Perfect beach book, as frequent naps and not paying attention fit well within the theme and style of the book.
In response to Before I Go to Sleep
Andrew.Toal posted on July 6, 2011
This guy I know has a really amazing tattoo of Shackleton. Might try and get to this one after Two Years Before the Mast. (Only one seafaring adventure at a time.)
In response to Endurance, Shackleton’s incredible voyage
Andrew.Toal posted on July 6, 2011
I read his last one (?), The Hour I First Believed. It infuriated me. Hope this one treats you better.
In response to I Know This Much Is True
Meg W. posted on July 4, 2011
I think that publishers still have the ability to reach out to more people than indie publishers or self-publishers. One has to be a little more willing to look for the books published by indie publishers or the self-published. You’re going to be hard pressed to find those kinds of books at a big box store or your local Barnes and Noble.
As a book blogger, I think that those within the book blogging community have the ability to become a sort of PR for the indies and the self-published but the fact of the matter is that most of the people who look to blogs for book recommendations are other book bloggers. It’s not a bad thing but our audiences are still pretty limited compared to those of the big name publishers.
In response to inTouch: Readers Have Won Their Independence…Hooray?
Kari Young posted on July 4, 2011
Personally book blogs have become an invaluable resource in finding new books and debut authors. I don’t need a gatekeeper when I have the internet and opinionated readers.
There is one thing I do miss about traditionally published books and that is editing. Even if a book is self-published the author should spend some money or time getting their book copy edited at least (and this is coming from someone who can’t spell or diagram a sentence).
In response to inTouch: Readers Have Won Their Independence…Hooray?
Kari Young posted on July 2, 2011
Jazz … Booze … Boys … It’s a dangerous combination.
What girl doesn’t want to be a flapper? This book captures the 20′s (or what I picture the 20′s to be) with
just enough clothes, slang and history to make this time period come to life.
At first I wasn’t wild about the premise, catty girls in the 20′s but my love affair with times gone by made me pick it up and I’m glad I did. It’s essentially a soap opera with Gloria falling for a taboo love, Clara’s dark secrets and Loraine bad choices but the back drop of 1920′s Chicago makes this book come to life.
In response to Vixen
Daniel Audet posted on July 1, 2011
I’ve known Jennifer for over 30 years, since back in the days of “those Hollywood nights”. Blessed and thrilled to see this book about her life thus far I can’t recommend it enough to anyone, ‘believer’ or not.
In response to From Life in the Hollywood Fast Lane to the Untouchables of India, Chasing Fame and Finding God
Meg W. posted on June 29, 2011
I read a really interesting LA Times blog post on this book basically saying how just being famous in the way that Ms. Palin is famous (1. For her mother being famous and 2. becoming the poster child for teen moms) doesn’t really warrant writing a memoir. I’ve gotta agree.
In response to inTouch: Bristol Palin’s “Not Afraid” of…Publicity
Kari Young posted on June 29, 2011
A fantastic start to a promising series. This book is such a fun read. It’s X-Men meets League of Extraordinary Gentlemen done teen style. I’m in.
Abilities, technology, apparel, evil inventors and set in Victorian London. I’m in.
This is a great introduction to the Steampunk genre. Can’t wait for the next book.
In response to The Girl in the Steel Corset
Andrew.Toal posted on June 29, 2011
I liked The Age of Wonder. Might check this one out.
In response to The Clockwork Universe, Isaac Newton, the Royal Society, and the Birth of the Modern World
Ken Favell posted on June 29, 2011
I’m still itchin’ and scratchin’ after reading this creepy horror novel set in a New York brownstone…possibly located near Guy and Rosemary Woodhouse’s place. Strange things certainly happen in those old New York apartments. Oof! I started the novel this morning as I waited in my foot doctor’s office, continued reading it when I stopped for lunch, read it while I waited for a friend at the movie theatre and finished it tonight. Ben Winters sets quite the mood and certainly gave me my share of shivers. What’s that red welt on your cheek? Could it be….a bedbug bite? Agggghhhhh!
In response to Bedbugs
Penni Sauer posted on June 28, 2011
So many points to touch on. I teach in a grade school and Dan is absolutely right. This is filtering down to 4th and 5th graders who are using “gay” as a slur and trying to spread rumors about those boys and girls who just don’t fit in, for whatever reason. I honestly don’t remember thinking about any of this at all in grade school. But there is progress. My two best friends in high school, one boy and one girl dated each other to keep their classmates from knowing they were gay. Even still, the girl was bullied and called a “lesbo” because she was an athlete (this was early 70s), and it was so hurtful and cruel. No one would have dared to use the “N-word” or call any of my friends “kikes,” but this was acceptable. Today, my daughter has at least 4 girlfriends who have come out and are proud lesbians. At her high school, the prom king and queen her junior year were a gay and lesbian. That’s here, in Chicagoland. Even our Bishop Hanson of the ELCA participated in your project. My nephew in Germany wasn’t fairing so well and had to switch schools. He stopped going to church because he says they hate him there and condemn him to hell. You’re right best of times, worst of times, depending on where you are and who supports you. You may not think of yourselves as heroes, but keep up the good work anyway.
In response to inRetro: LGBT Youth, It’s the Best and Worst of Times According to Dan Savage
David posted on June 27, 2011
To my mind a “digital autograph” is no autograph at all. It’s a facsimile. That people would even consider it a real thing brings to mind all sorts of disturbing ideas about what people accept as “reality” today.
In response to Excuse Me, Can I Get Your E-Autograph?
Ken Favell posted on June 26, 2011
IRON HOUSE was an entertaining summer read with well developed charcters and a quick pace. But the graphic violence was a bit much for me to handle. Gritty and dark, this thriller isn’t for everyone. Don’t read it while you’re eating.
In response to Iron House
marieke posted on June 26, 2011
Scariest article I’ve read this year, but the allusion to Bachman’s titanium testicles made me laugh out loud.
In response to Michele Bachmann’s Holy War | Rolling Stone Politics
Kari Young posted on June 25, 2011
Skivs! I wanted to love it but didn’t. Maybe my expectations were too high.
There are so many good things going on in this book: the premise, the characters and the world Julia Karr creates are all excellent. However she got a little preachy. Her message about the power of media, sexteens and porn was so heavy handed I caught myself rolling my eyes. At one point I thought I was back in film school and waiting to hear “Don’t objectify me with your male gaze.”
I liked Sal. I thought the tension between him and Nina could have been built up more. It was a little too easy for them but I liked his revolutionary ways.
I’m on the fence about recommending this book. If you like dystopian YA then it’s worth the read.
In response to XVI
Kari Young posted on June 25, 2011
They cure cancer but unleash a virus that kills girls at 20 and boys at 25. I’m in.
Rhine is kidnapped and forced into a polygamist marriage. I’m in.
There’s a hot servant that she’s crushing on. I’m in.
But this is where she lost me.
*SPOILER ALERT*
– Sure she’s kidnapped but treated really well.
– Linden, her husband is really nice and respectful. He’s also a lot naive.
– She’s nutty for Gabriele who’s she’s had like 6 conversations with.
– Her life before all this wasn’t so great.
– You only have 3.5 years left, stay with the rich dude. Her rat invested basement just doesn’t seem that great.
I admit I read this quickly and enjoyed it but there were some major story flaws.
In response to Wither
the golden witch posted on June 24, 2011
Not bad for a debut, I’ll tell you that. There were some places that were a bit cliche (getting revenge on the mean kids), but most of it was quite original (combining the idea of using the Furies as a method to punish those who do bad/immoral/questionable things), and really enjoyable. This one’s definitely going on my bookshelf at some point, just for that aspect alone.
Okay, so left, right, and center we now have paranormal books using the Greek canon in modern day formats. There’s “Starcrossed”, “Darkness Becomes Her”, and now “Fury” – all very good, all using the Greek mythos in different aspects to tell their tales. I could get used to this trend of use if it keeps producing such good results.
I think my biggest problem was indeed with the idea of the mean/popular/rich kids getting punished (not a bad thing, but it’s been done to death within YA canon), but what Miles did with that overused trope really turned everything around (aside from having a Big Reveal I wasn’t exactly expecting near the end of the book). There’s the admission by Drea, one of the unpopular kids, knowledgable on the Furies, that the Furies themselves don’t really get the difference within the spectrum of “bad/hurtful” things that people do – they only see bad and good, right and wrong, black and white – not how things in life really are. And the way Miles does this is absolutely awesome, which is what not only saves the story but boosts it to my “best of 2011″ list.
For example, we have Emily, Gabby, and Zach – that entire love triangle that was waiting to happen, which Zach more or less instigated by himself. While Emily is definitely not innocent (and she owns up to this only after one or two sessions of denial – definitely progress in YA relationship lit), Drea admits that what happened to Chase for doing bad things and what’s going to happen to Emily if things keep going unchecked are different on the moral scale. Chase pretty much ruined a girl’s entire life, not just breaking her heart, but breaking all of her. Emily was semi-coerced into an illicit relationship with her best friend’s boyfriend, though she understood it was wrong and did break it off. Because she did, she was rewarded, while still being punished for hurting her friend. But her reward for repentance came with a huge cost, though we don’t know what that is (to be revealed in the rest of the series). The fact that Miles really hammers home that everything comes with a cost, including forgiveness, is important. A lot of YA lit doesn’t do this, or they overdo it and make it the Moral of the Story. Here, I think the Moral of the Story is the fact that the world is not Good or Bad, but it’s a gradation of good, bad, and what’s in between. Just like there is no moral black or white, but a series of grays. It’s all about how and where we choose to fall in that gradation with our choices and actions. Using the Furies and their blindness (not just physical blindness too, as how they’ve been described throughout history) is a great way to further the ultimate message to the reader.
So I really commend Miles on an awesome story. I seriously cannot wait to read the rest of the series, and look forward to more Furies awesomeness to come. I have so many questions that are currently unanswered (what triggers the Furies coming to town, even though we know they’re always hanging around somewhere in time and space, is a good example). I can’t wait to find out what this price is that Emily paid (aside from the fact that she is now doomed to unrequited love with her other best friend), if it’s more than what was already stated (and I think it is).
Miles, be proud. You saved an overused teenage trope and turned into pure awesomeness. Wear my “Best of 2011″ badge with pride!
(posted to inreads, goodreads, librarything, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
In response to Fury
Linda F posted on June 24, 2011
Tom Hanks is mine
In response to The Art of the Intellectual Crush
the golden witch posted on June 24, 2011
Wow. That’s pretty much all I can say after two days of processing an amazing ending that was NINE BOOKS in the making. If “Naamah’s Blessing” doesn’t propel the “Kushiel’s Legacy” series into epic fantasy, I don’t know what will, or even what epic fantasy even is anymore.
It really amazes me how Carey managed to tie up pretty much everything from the first book in the “Kushiel” series (“Kushiel’s Dart”) up until this last book in the series, number nine. Any loose ends that readers might have picked up at the end of each trilogy was brilliantly tied together by the end of “Naamah’s Blessing”. Seriously. Guys, this is talent. Any doubts I might have had about Carey as a writer are more or less absolutely gone now.
All I can hope, though, is that this isn’t the last we’ve heard of the “Kushiel’s Legacy” world. It seems that per trilogy time in that world progressed somewhere from 100-300 years from the last book of one trilogy to the first of a next. That’s just an estimate for me, but it felt about right. I think we started somewhere in what might be the mid-to-late 15th century in Kushiel’s Dart and ended in the 18th Century (or possibly the early 19th century). But the mirrors that Carey built from her world to ours (or perhaps the reverse) were striking in detail with nothing left to the imagination in terms of a firm and solid setting.
And it was good to see all of the old characters coming back in some way or another by the end of this book. It was good to see Moirin reflecting on not only her own journey, but the journey of humanity within the “Kushiel” world, and where it might be going. How in the end, we’re all connected, regardless of color, creed, etc. It seems too grandiose when I say it now, but if you read it, you’ll surely feel it on the same epic scale I did. This is the final message of the “Kushiel” series, should it choose to end here. And I really hope it doesn’t. Not by a long shot. I’d love to see what might turn out to be America in that other world, and the other countries, the wars, and everything that comes with them. I want to see the evolution of the people of Terre d’Ange to what they might be like today. If that makes sense.
If this is the end, then it’s a good ending. If not, it’s a fantastic place for a new story to begin. I can only hope it’s the former, though, because I’m addicted to the “Kushiel” world. Definitely one of my picks under the romantic fantasy catagory for 2011.
(posted to librarything, goodreads, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
In response to Naamah’s Blessing
the golden witch posted on June 24, 2011
Picking up right where we left off at the end of “The Dead-Tossed Waves”, “The Dark and Hollow Places” ups the pace of the story, making us feel just as desperate as the rest of the main characters thus far.
This last third book in the trilogy (though I really, really hope there are others!) unites all of the characters we’ve met since the first book together in a frenetic union of panic and love, lust and hurt. Annah’s love of her sister combined with the hate that springs forth once she learns how Abagail/Gabry grew up is a tasty treat, sweet and sour, to be enjoyed slowly as it simmers to a head near the middle of the book. Just as the first book was Mary’s story and the second was Gabry’s, make no mistake that this last story in the trilogy belongs to Annah and Ryan never lets us forget that. We’re deeply immersed in Annah and her psyche the entire time, and how she fights with herself on whether she loves or hates her sister, Catcher, and Elias.
Between this and the panic spurred on by the actions of Catcher, Elias, and Gabry at the end of the previous book, it feels like you’re on a marathon – heart pounding, lactic acid in your legs the entire time. And it burns – teenage love in the middle of a world that’s ending.
But it burns so, so good. Ryan has only honed and perfected her craft of agonized teenage affection throughout all three books, which is really well represented in this last story.
And then there’s the generational aspect as well; Mary’s story was the first story, somewhere around 20 years previous to the second book. By the end of this third book, you get the feeling that things have come full circle, that there is hope, another generation to be born, and even though they may have to fight for their lives, they WILL live.
That, ultimately, I think is Ryan’s message: if there’s life there’s hope, and if there’s hope, there’s love. And that’s what makes us different from the dead, just as Annah says in the book – the fact that we’re aware and fight for these emotions makes us alive, makes us fallible, but makes us human. This is the line that separates us from the dead.
I really hope there are more books in the world of “Hands and Teeth” – “Hare Moon”, a novella just released online (which I haven’t had a chance to read yet), apparently also takes place in the same universe. But I’d like a prequel, maybe something to answer what happened to cause the Return, or a sequel/separate trilogy of what happened after this last book. I won’t take no for an answer.
This one’s in my top five for 2011 so far, and the year’s not even over yet. Simply gorgeous.
(crossposted to librarything, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
In response to The Dark and Hollow Places
the golden witch posted on June 24, 2011
Guys. GUYS. Two words for you: Vampire. Thief. That’s all you need to know going into reading this series. It’s so very, very awesome and it blew me away. I think I actually like this series more than Priest’s “Clockwork Century” series and I’ve only read the first book so far. Needless to say, I’m practically foaming at the mouth for the next book now.
I loved everything about this book. Priest executed all of the pieces of her plot more or less perfectly. Raylene is a sympathetic, hilarious character that has neurotic pitfalls – making her more human than vampire most of the time (especially with her magical bag of tricks that she carries everywhere with her). I mean, come on. Neurotic vampires? In 99% of urban fantasy (and YA paranormal, though this isn’t YA, obviously), vampires are cocky, gorgeous, and utterly sure of themselves with excellent self-esteem. Raylene is pretty and cocky, but not the rest. Her cockiness comes from years and years of experience within the game of thievery and fencing, not out of just being undead. I like that Priest made her that way, because I felt like I could connect to her all the more easily. I’m pretty neurotic myself, so it was nice to see a paranormal creature have some mental issues herself.
And then there’s the main plot – government experiments. I love plots with government experiments. And this one just made me hunger for more information, as this book kind of left us on a cliffhanger. Yes, there were some of the questions answered at the end, but the larger ones (how did the government find out that there were vampires, or werewolves, at all, for instance?) were left open. As we’re getting a second book soon (and I seriously cannot wait to get my hot little hands on it), I’m hoping we’ll get more of these larger answers soon. It looks like the entire cast will be back for book two, which makes me all the more excited.
This, of course, means more ass-kicking ex-Navy SEAL drag queens, of course. Priest, I love you. Seriously. Have my literary babies, won’t you? Thieving vamps, government experiments, and drag queens. What a book.
If you’re tired of the “chicks in leather pants” stereotype/truth of the urban fantasy genre, try out “Bloodshot” and get some much needed fresh air into you. You definitely will NOT regret it. Definitely one of my picks for the best of 2011 in the urban fantasy genre.
(crossposted to librarything, goodreads, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
In response to Bloodshot
the golden witch posted on June 24, 2011
This was actually a recommendation from fellow 2011 debut author and all around awesome friend Josephine Angelini — when I met her for our interview, she couldn’t stop raving about this book! So naturally, my curiosity was quite peaked. That and Josie has good taste in books anyway, so..yeah. This, ladies and gentlemen, is yet another example of awesome YA romance done right. It’s balanced with humor and its supernatural plot elements so I didn’t feel suffocated by it. Definitely one of my picks for 2011 so far (along with “Starcrossed”).
Plum definitely has a way with words — so much so that I felt as if I really were in Paris. I’ve never been to Paris, either, so that is really saying something. She has created an entirely new supernatural canon of creatures within the age-old construct of good versus evil, dead versus undead. I really loved the way she played with all of these different concepts but on a level so subtle I didn’t really realize all of this put together until near the end of the (way too short!) book.
Vincent seemed like a realistic guy — yeah, he’s pretty, but he’s also smart. He’s protective, but he also lets his girl have her independence. This is very refreshing within the realm of YA romance lit, and I can only count a few more titles that have this quality to their romances. It’s nice to see the girl saving the day instead of being the damsel in distress — better, it’s having her be both the hero and the damsel while saving another damsel (Vincent, in this case). It’s the unison of the male and the female within one body, the neuter gender quality once she’s let Vincent-as-Volant enter her to help fight the Numa. It takes balls to write a fiesty female lead like this one, much less a romance with her in it.
I found no flaws with this book — it had me from the first page. The debut class of 2011 has quite a few authors that have written stories that have kept my attention and deserved my praise. “Die for Me” is one of them, and I hope this isn’t the last we hear from Plum.
Want a non-traditional ghost story, or romance? Pick this book up and see how romance can be done without being shoved down your throat.
(crossposted to librarything, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
In response to Die for Me
the golden witch posted on June 24, 2011
If I ever have children, you can be sure that this is going to be the very first book I have in my bedtime story library. Never have I laughed so hard, and never have I wished more that this book existed when I babysat other kids as a teenager. Yes, it was that awesome. Especially I went and got the audiobook version – Samuel L. Jackson as the narrator? GENIUS. Pure genius.
Okay, seriously. I think we’ve all had to go and babysit for someone at some point in our lives; for family members, for summer jobs, etc., and our charges weren’t very good about going to sleep at night. Right now, this is my little niece – she almost never sleeps. I got this book in audiobook format for my uncle and cousin so they can release some stress (safely) while trying to get her to go to sleep at the same time for Father’s Day this year.
This book is all about that absolutely desperate feeling you get when you just want the child to be unconscious so you can have a little you time, or date time with your significant other, or something similar. You love the child, sure, or you’re fond of them enough to be there reading them a bedtime story (even if it’s a babysitting job). You NEED them to be unconscious for the sake of your sanity.
Some might call this book crude and irreverent, but honestly, it’s nothing like that. At least, that’s how I think of it. This was written by a parent for his children, illustrated by a parent for his children, so it’s not like they’re doing it out of anger at their children. This is for the parents/caretakers more than the children to be sure, but it’s still sweet in that it goes over every single excuse in the book children at bedtime will use to try to get out of it.
The bonus interview with Jackson at the beginning of the audiobook version is helpful, too, because he too relates as an exasperated parent/caretaker with his kids and trying to get them to go to sleep. All of this is done out of love. Desperate, awful love, but love all the same. And you can tell.
So have a good time with this book. It’s obviously not to be taken seriously as a children’s book, otherwise it’d probably be censored by the government or something. Release a little stress and laugh. But not too loud, or your child might wake up, and then you just might have to read them this book after all in desperation to save your nerves.
One of the best of 2011 for the children’s book/humor categories. Loved it, and I can’t wait to own the hardcover! This will definitely go down as one of the classics (like “Where the Wild Things Are”) as subversive bedtime lit. Mark my words.
(crossposted to librarything, goodreads, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
In response to Go the F**k to Sleep
the golden witch posted on June 24, 2011
I tried to finish this one, I really did. I just found that I couldn’t. The original plot was interesting enough, but that quickly declined after a few chapters and it descended into mediocrity.
I think the author was aiming for high or epic fantasy with writing this book, but it just didn’t hit the mark. As Alera’s story continues with her getting harrassed by her suitors right and left, I found it harder and harder to emotionally click with her. What happened to the awesome blood-soaked mystery that I read at the start of the book? All of this seemed to fly out the window and with it, all sense of continuity by the time I reached the third chapter.
Writing something that could be considered both YA and high fantasy is hard – I will definitely give Kluver that much. However, you don’t have to stuff romance into something to make it palatable to the YA audience. The (attempted, since neither guy seemed to click with her) romance here felt very forced, whereas in Cinda Williams Chima’s “Seven Realms” series, the romance there is far more gentle and more natural, coming very slowly but that’s what felt right about it. Here, had there been attempted no romance, I think the novel would have worked far better and would have landed itself into the “pretty good” realm of YA high fantasy.
Furthermore, I feel like Kluver didn’t really put enough into her attempted romance even though she did try to force it with the characters. She could have built chemistry if she’d been really determined to have a love triangle, but she didn’t. That’s another thing that really disappointed me about this book – Kluver seems like she’s a really promising writer, but everything fell short of the mark in almost every category. Alera didn’t feel real, I couldn’t connect to her, and not all YA books need a love triangle. In the end, that’s what did it for me.
This isn’t to say that I’m not averse to reading anything new of Kluver’s – bring it on! I would like to see more from her, and I hope that her next book is far better than this one.
(originally posted at witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com, crossposted to goodreads and shelfari)
In response to Legacy
the golden witch posted on June 24, 2011
I have to say, Angelini definitely took a risk with her story when you consider the amount of YA fiction that’s currently paranormal/past life/myth-based that’s hit the shelves within the last few years. But you know what? Unlike so many of the hyped titles out there, girl made it WORK.
Just as the title suggests, there is a theme of starcrossed lovers from the past in the background of this tale, but it’s not so utterly overwhelming (say it together, kids! “twilight syndrome”) that it smothers the base arc and ideas of the plot itself.
If there’s going to be romance in my story, that’s the kind of romance I like. Let it sit in the background and let it grow until it finally comes to the forefront on its own, with its own momentum, and not pushed or forced like so many of the same sub-genre type of YA books. And thankfully, luckily, Angelini does it with grace and style with ancient Greece meeting Romeo and Juliet (without the suiciding, of course – but I tend to think of this story more in terms of the 1996 film version) in a tolerable and fun way. And of course, the bloody weeping furies don’t hurt, either.
The idea of familial houses feuding mixed with Greek myths is something I hadn’t really considered before, and when I read the inital blurb when it hit goodreads I was more than a little wary about how the content would flow despite the fact that the these two themes work perfectly together when one considers all of the ancient Greek literary canon. It’s difficult to make the two place nicely together in a modern setting, but this time, from page one I was captured by Angelini’s characters and the world she built around them. Or is it the other way around – the world that built itself around her characters?
What was also refreshing was the abundance of male restraint shown by Lucas around Helen after they stopped trying to kill each other – not out of wariness in terms of paranoia (“oh god she’s going to kill me”), but in terms of not only respect, but keeping himself in check with sexual advances (“oh god the world’s going to go to hell if I give in, no seriously it will”). Can I just say that it’s really refreshing to have a sexually-positive atmosphere with these characters, all acknowledging what they want, who they want, and being frank about it? The “twilight syndrome” that’s been going around (seriously, CDC, get on top of it) has this kind of subversive sexuality that’s not even fun, but rather repressive and self-destructive to all characters involved. (I could go and make a “Bella was a sexual predator” argument here, but I’m not even going to touch that right now.) You have two characters falling for each other and very aware of their hormones, but they’re also aware of the consequences of what will happen should they give in to their baser instincts. Very rarely with paranormal YA fiction do you have the clear and explicit outlining of what will happen should characters get involved sexually. I’m not speaking of things in a physical sense (you get pregnant, etc), but more in a broader, larger, existential worldview – what will happen to the world around you, the people you love aside from your partner, etc. Aside from the “Hex Hall” series (so far) and “XVI”, that hasn’t really been bluntly addressed in mainstream YA paranormal fiction as of yet. At least, that’s how it feels to me.
It could be that I’m overanalyzing things on this one, but that’s par for the course for me. Insert a Kanye shrug here.
The way that violence, sex, myths, and life is addressed is wonderfully explicit and rare. This makes me one happy reader.
For all of these reasons (and many more), I’d say “Starcrossed” is definitely one of the best of 2011 so far in the catagory of new series. If the teasers I provided last week for Teaser Tuesday weren’t enough, just sneak into your local bookstore once it’s on the shelves and read parts of it for yourself. You won’t be sorry.
(crossposted to librarything and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
In response to Starcrossed
the golden witch posted on June 24, 2011
There, I said it.
But when I saw this at the library, I figured I may as well give it a whirl. I’ve enjoyed the literary mashups (“Pride, Prejudice, and Zombies”, anyone?) that have been so popular as of late – they make Austen tolerable for me. I hoped that “Jane” would bring that same pleasure. And thankfully, that hope wasn’t in vain.
I had my reservations about reading another Austen remake, because the original hadn’t really stuck well with me over the years. It puzzles me why girls fall all over themselves over characters like Mr. Darcy (though he wasn’t in this book) – give me Dickens over Austen any day. His social justice-centered stories seem much deeper than that of Austen’s superficial ones (well, in my opinion, they’ve always had a more superficial feel to them).
So you can see why I had my reservations about picking up a more faithful, less zombie-filled version of an Austen remake.
Lindner has skills. I will give her that – she has made me actually love this book far more than the original, to the point where I’m wanting to reread the original to compare where she made changes. I got attached to Jane Moore and Nico Rathburn and the entire drama between them, which is rare for me. To say that I loved this book is a very rare thing as I usually run screaming for the hills when I encounter anything even resembling this sort of story.
So, instead of the endless “Jane Eyre” remakes, can we have a movie or a miniseries for this book? I know I’d watch it.
All of my issues with female-centric lit aside, this book is very much worth reading for anyone, Austen fans and the not alike. It dragged me kicking and screaming into Lindner’s world, and I had fun with it each minute. Wonderful remake.
Quirk Classics? The ball is now in your court. Wow me.
(crossposted to librarything, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
In response to Jane
the golden witch posted on June 24, 2011
I was born in the 80s, I grew up in the 90s, when the media market image of girls became the most sexualized it’s ever been. Flashbacks of CNN debates about the oversexing of the “desired” female image in the west came to mind when I started reading this book – not that that’s a a bad thing. This book paints a picture of what our future may be if we keep going the way we’re going.
I have to say – for a debut, I was floored by the sheer balls that Karr has for even bringing up this i…moreI was born in the 80s, I grew up in the 90s, when the media market image of girls became the most sexualized it’s ever been. Flashbacks of CNN debates about the oversexing of the “desired” female image in the west came to mind when I started reading this book – not that that’s a a bad thing. This book paints a picture of what our future may be if we keep going the way we’re going.
I have to say – for a debut, I was floored by the sheer balls that Karr has for even bringing up this issue, much less couching it in a future that seems all too plausible as clothing sizes get smaller, more and more skin is bared on primetime television, and kids start having sex at younger and younger ages (not to mention starting puberty at record early ages as well).
I like to think of myself as a sex-positive girl. I believe that as long as everyone has informed consent with their sex, I have no right to intervene or complain. The keywords here are “informed consent” – not just consent, which can be taken advantage of by sex predators in terms of ignorance on the part of the victim, but informed consent – knowing your risks, knowing where you’re safe and where you’re not. This book really hit home with me as I’ve never really felt comfortable about expressing my sexuality (well, that and I have severe intimacy issues, but we won’t get into that now) and the idea of being fair game as soon as you turn sixteen, whether you like it or not, scared the hell out of me.
Which, I think, was one of the points of the book – rethink the current policies and images as projected to us by modern culture in order to keep ourselves safe.
I believe that this book should probably be made mandatory reading by parents to their daughters before they get taken advantage of. Knowledge is power, and we as girls need all the power we can get in order to protect ourselves.
Thank you, Ms. Karr, for writing this book, for urging us not to be complacent and to remind us of the dangers out there that if we leave unchecked, could very well be our future.
(crossposted to goodreads, inreads, librarything, shelfari, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
In response to XVI
the golden witch posted on June 24, 2011
This is a gorgeous, wonderful book. I just have to say that right up front. It has all that I look for in this genre (alternate history/steampunk) – mad scientists, detectives, general paranormal activity, feisty females, and a little (but not too much) romance. Oh, and did I mention it also features a primitive version of Skynet?
When you throw all of the above mentioned features together and put it into an accessible YA package, you have my heart for life. This is a great adventure…moreThis is a gorgeous, wonderful book. I just have to say that right up front. It has all that I look for in this genre (alternate history/steampunk) – mad scientists, detectives, general paranormal activity, feisty females, and a little (but not too much) romance. Oh, and did I mention it also features a primitive version of Skynet?
When you throw all of the above mentioned features together and put it into an accessible YA package, you have my heart for life. This is a great adventure and relief to read – I was afraid that it might be too stereotypically chick-lit in terms of the romance area (considering the publisher being Harlequin and all), but Cross writes it in so subtly that you’re halfway in before you figure out what’s going on between Finley and Griff. And that itself is a breath of fresh air when you consider anything with romance in the realm of YA, especially as of late.
All of these elements are hard to get right by themselves, much less when you throw them together and make a delicious soup like this one.
And then there’s the mystery element – who is the machinist? What are his objectives? Cross subtly builds up the tension between the romance and the appearances of Jack Dandy (Jack the Ripper), along with trying to keep Finley’s head (and soul) together yet balances all of these things with the talent of someone from Cirque du Soleil. And the primitive version of Skynet robots killing (or horribly maiming) people! I enjoyed all aspects of this book, and can find no faults at all with it. And coming from me? I guess that’s high praise, seeing how picky I am and all.
Aside from the novella that’s just been released, I really hope that this isn’t the last full-length book set in Cross’ finely constructed ‘verse. I’ll be reviewing the novella as well, but I’ll still be waiting for news on a second book. More like squirming in my seat like a five year old, but you get the idea.
Want some steampunk that’s empowering for girls? Pick up “The Girl in the Steel Corset”. Afterwards, you’ll want a steel corset of your very own.
(crossposted to shelfari, goodreads, librarything, and witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com)
In response to The Girl in the Steel Corset
the golden witch posted on June 24, 2011
(review from witchoftheatregoing.wordpress.com, posted to librarything, goodreads, inreads, shelfari)
This has been on my tbr list since last year, before the cover came up. The idea of curing cancer and damning the human race to extinction tasted a bit of “The Children of Men” (if you’re a fan of “Wither”, you simply MUST read “Children of Men”) and a bit of “Big Love” and the TLC show, “Sister Wives”. Combine all of this together? One amazingly wonderful clusterfuck of a horrifying future that just seems all too real and possible, especially these days.
Apotheosis: the process in which cells die and thus prevent conditions like cancer from happening within the body of any living creature. If you cure this process without any substitute for cells to age and recycle out of the system, you come up with a nightmare scenario that DeStefano has created in her new trilogy, “Wither”.
I won’t lie – I finished “Wither” in more or less one sitting. I literally could NOT put it down. I love dystopia-themed books, and the idea of sister wives fascinates me to no end (no thanks to my brief stint as a mormon as a child – don’t ask). This book is most definitely not for the squeamish, starting out with a bang (literally, and many of them) for our heroine, Rhine, and the girls who come to be her sister wives in the household of Linden and Vaughn. The idea of having to become breeding stock is abhorrent to any modern female these days (and I know I’m not the only one who feels this way, obviously), and there were parts of this book where I had to put it down for a few moments before picking it back up again just to process the sheer obscenity and horror of having girls as young as 13 (or younger) being used as incubators for fetuses.
But I think this is what DeStefano was aiming for – to really visit the horror of this world where everything looks and feels pretty on the outside, but is completely rotten on the inside upon the reader, to impress upon the audience the sheer helplessness of the feeling of the timebomb in one’s body, knowing exactly, more or less, how long you’re going to live, knowing what your worth is based on your fertility.
Frankly, in a world where we’re trying to find cures to all diseases possible, DeStefano has balls for writing this book. And I give her major props for this – it takes a lot of bravery to speak up and say “well, uh, we uh, might need diseases so things like this scenario won’t happen”.
To say that I’m anxious for the next book is putting it lightly. Definitely one of the best of 2011, hands down. I know I’ll be rereading it quite a bit over the next year.
In response to Wither
Denise posted on June 24, 2011
@denimorse – Jon Stewart
In response to The Art of the Intellectual Crush
jmprice9 posted on June 24, 2011
@jmprice9 liked this one too!
In response to The Art of the Intellectual Crush
MOMFOREVERANDEVER posted on June 24, 2011
redford is mine
In response to The Art of the Intellectual Crush
Kat posted on June 24, 2011
Twitter party lover!
In response to Celebrities We Wish Would Write Books
Newbie Mum posted on June 24, 2011
I need one on Gandhi!
In response to Celebrities We Wish Would Write Books
Newbie Mum posted on June 24, 2011
Awesome article!
In response to Celebrities We Wish Would Write Books
Kari Young posted on June 24, 2011
I think the question of “Is borrowing a book piracy?” is an interesting one. We own the physical book and can do with as we please. However, we do not own the content and the digital age makes that clear.
I also think the publishers need to be careful because I would bet that the people pirating books are also the people buying books. My friend justifies his piracy by only stealing books he would never purchase. If he likes the book then he’s more apt to buy a different book by that author and tell people about it.
In response to inTouch: Should Book Pirates Walk the Plank?
Jonathan Mugan posted on June 24, 2011
Great post. This whole online presence thing seems to be extending beyond authors or other creative types to all kinds of jobs. Even computer programmers (the old term for app developers) are starting to build a reputation online that they take to the workplace.
In response to The End of Blog-to-Book Deals and Twitterature?
Daniel Audet posted on June 24, 2011
Hi Liz,
Point #3 here is right on the money. I’m seeing writers use age old networking skills via social media, blogs, etc. and connecting with bloggers, journalists and others in and out of publishing who have an eye out for great writing and/or new writers. Still, it gets down to great writing in my view. Mastery ans use of all the cool new channels won’t do much for you if the writing isn’t sale-able. In my opinion. I really really hope my fellow techie pals/writers realize this beforehand.
In response to The End of Blog-to-Book Deals and Twitterature?
Dave Cullen posted on June 24, 2011
The cover of my (Ballantine) edition touts this as “The GREATEST WAR NOVEL OF ALL TIME.” (with the “The” mostly lower case, for some reason.)
That’s quite a claim, but one I heartily agree with. I’m working on a book about soldiers, and the first thing I did was plunge back into reading this, 25 years later.
I wondered if it would still hold up for me. Was it just a youthful literary love affair, or was it all about my timing? (I read it while I was on active duty in the U.S. Infantry.)
Still stunning. The translation can be clunky at times (eg, all the ten-dollar words inserted in place of “said.”) But I brush those off.
Brilliant.
In response to All quiet on the western front, with related readings
Daniel Audet posted on June 24, 2011
Love this cover. Covers are SO important
In response to Jane
Dave Cullen posted on June 24, 2011
I didn’t like this one–at all. I’m kinda baffled by the glowing reviews. Can anyone help me understand that?
In response to In the Garden of Beasts, Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler’s Berlin
Dave Cullen posted on June 24, 2011
This is my all-time favorite book.
I keep a list on my wall labeled, “WHEN I GET STUCK.” (Stuck writing.) #4 is Read something amazing. I have this book in mind. I dive back in and in under a page I’m inspired by how glorious great writing can be.
Nabokov is the master, and this is his greatest work. Sentence after sentence amazes me. I could drink it in endlessly.
In response to Speak, memory, an autobiography revisited
Dave Cullen posted on June 24, 2011
This infuriated me for about 50 pages, then it clicked and amazed me. So glad I kept going.
It was a stunning feat to pull off all the shifting first-person narrators, but not stunt-writing by a longshot. Seeing the world through such drastically different points of view were a revelation: about this story and about storytelling.
I read the book just as I was reconceiving “Columbine,” and it gave me the courage to try something different, but daunting: ten storylines. I’ll be forever grateful.
In response to As I lay dying, the corrected text
Dave Cullen posted on June 24, 2011
This is one of my all-time favorites. If I can ever write with the clarity, vividness and human insight of Denis, I will die a happy man.
I have this as my first quote on my facebook page. Extraordinary:
“Down the hall came the wife. She was glorious, burning. She didn’t know yet that her husband was dead. We knew. That’s what gave her so much power over us. The doctor took her into a room with a desk at the end of the hall, and from under the closed door a slab of brilliance radiated as if, by some stupendous process, diamonds were being incinerated in there. What a pair of lungs! She shrieked as I imagined an eagle would shriek. It felt wonderful to be alive to hear it! I’ve gone looking for that feeling everywhere.” — Denis Johnson, Car Crash While Hitchhiking
In response to Jesus’ son, stories
Kari Young posted on June 23, 2011
I like this idea. You may have some push back from bookstores though. I recently went to a signing and the author was only allowed to sign books purchased at that bookstore (A receipt was required). There was also a disclaimer stating that no signing of e-readers of any kind was allowed.
In response to Excuse Me, Can I Get Your E-Autograph?
Kari Young posted on June 23, 2011
“I’ve confessed to everything and I’d like to be hanged. Now, if you please.” This is the first line and it only gets better.
The book is disorienting in that it takes place in a swamp during the turn of the last century outside of London. It evokes feelings of New Orleans rather than London but it reminds of Julia Robert’s face. The individual pieces aren’t beautiful but when you bring them all together, they’re remarkable.
That’s this book. It’s disorienting, gruesome and beautiful all at the time.
If you like your YA to have witches, folklore and love then read it.
In response to Chime
Allen Weiner posted on June 23, 2011
Honestly, I found the latest Myron Bolitar book to be tired and predictable. Hope it brings this once great series to an end
In response to Live Wire
Drew posted on June 23, 2011
Yeah, agreed. The end was abrupt, but such is the nature of tabloids, I reckon. When I went to talk with him, I actually brought a copy of the Library of America writings of A.J. Liebling (which Pete edited). I love that about him that he can swim comfortably in so many different subjects, be it journalism, fiction, sports, comics, art or anything else that he finds interesting. A generalist, and a gentleman.
In response to The Way Pete Hamill Sees It, Writing is Writing
Laura posted on June 23, 2011
Amazing insight into the Anorexic mindframe. Exquisitely written and deeply personal. I highly recommend it, especially for teenage girls, or any woman who has or is struggling with body image or eating disorders. Don’t skip the epilogue!
In response to Unbearable Lightness, A Story of Loss and Gain
Wendy posted on June 23, 2011
Lucille, your entry could have gone either way (posts vs. thoughts) – the real key was linking it to the book so that anyone who clicks there (like me!) can learn more about it.
I got mildly obsessed with Columbine after reading Wally Lamb’s “The Hour I First Believed” so will definitely be getting Dave’s book to learn from his first-hand account. When Columbine happened, I thought about it in terms of “What if I had been a student that day?” but now as a parent I think “What if my kids were in the school that day?” The more information I have to process all of that, the better!
In response to Columbine
David posted on June 23, 2011
That fourth paragraph hits the nail on the head. You make a really good point.
In response to inTouch: Is a TV Show the “New Novel?”
Dave Cullen posted on June 22, 2011
Thanks for the info, Wendy and Clint. I had no idea Google got it wrong, and was/is propogating the mistake throughout the web universe.
It took awhhile, but I finally found a place on Google to report the problem. (It’s frustrating to deal with the great automated void. I’ve been down this road with Amazon before. Like reasoning with a brick wall.)
Lucille, thanks so much for that.
In response to Columbine
Lucille Zimmerman posted on June 22, 2011
I’m going to jump right in. InReads looks like a great site. First question, is it best to post comments under “thoughts” or “posts?”
I was a bit nervous to pick this book up and read it, but since I know the author and live in Littleton, I tippy-toed in.
I was hooked from page one. I felt like Dave described everything about my hometown, the school, the neighborhoods, the churches,and the people the way an alien would. As an outside observer telling you what it was like. Yet he portrays an authentic version of what unfolded.
Dave is a gifted writer. This book reads like fiction – in the genre of “In Cold Blood” — but sadly, we know the events really took place.
Dave was one of the first on the scene that day. He investigated, interviewed, wrote, and immersed himself into the story for almost ten years before this book was published.
I know lots of other people who, like me, were afraid to read it, but almost all were glad they did. Many of my friends are writers and/or agents. Almost all gave it a thumbs up.
One more thing…Even though this book contains difficult material, it is also filled with stories of hope and heroism.
In response to Columbine
Ken Favell posted on June 22, 2011
An entertaining thriller/mystery/horror novel that makes a good summer read. If you enjoy Koontz or King you’ll probably like Koryta.
In response to The Ridge
Meg @ A Bookish Affair posted on June 22, 2011
As with any business venture, you have to protect yourself and know exactly what is going to be required of you. Writing is a hard job and with overhead like Frey’s company has, it doesn’t sound like his writers are getting much out of the company. Self-publishing seems pretty lucrative now!
In response to inDepth: It’s A Hard Time to Be a Young Writer and James Frey Isn’t Helping. (Part 2)
Clint posted on June 22, 2011
Hi Dave,
Wendy is right. The search is powered by Google Search. You can visit this page though to report an issue regarding the metadata stored for a specific book:
http://books.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=175010
Hope that helps. ~Clint
In response to Columbine
roadsidered posted on June 22, 2011
just finished tabloid last night. found it engrossing, but the ending left me thinking, “that’s it?”
snow in august remains peter’s best fiction.
In response to The Way Pete Hamill Sees It, Writing is Writing
Wendy posted on June 22, 2011
Hi Dave,
The search is powered by Google so I’m thinking the error is in the Google database somehow, but let me double check that. Thanks for noting it!
In response to Columbine
Dave Cullen posted on June 22, 2011
I cant wait to read this. Yoo is one of the funniest people writing today. I loved his earlier books.
In response to The Detention Club
Dave Cullen posted on June 22, 2011
A quibble, but it may affect searches. Whoever loaded the book got my name wrong. It should be Dave, not David.
(I’m not sure how to correct that.)
In response to Columbine
BookGoggles posted on June 22, 2011
This is pretty intriguing, I have to say. The whole thing with FFF is pretty creepy.
In response to inDepth: It’s A Hard Time to Be a Young Writer and James Frey Isn’t Helping. (Part 1)
Jon posted on June 21, 2011
Great article! And $250 pays for how many minutes of a class at Columbia?
In response to inDepth: It’s A Hard Time to Be a Young Writer and James Frey Isn’t Helping. (Part 1)
Donna Hardwick posted on June 20, 2011
I’m mom to an amazing 20 month old; my reading shelf at the moment consists of Goodnight Moon, Curious George, and Where the Wild Things Are…to name just a few. One book I’ve gotten to re-read with her is “The Giving Tree” by Shel Silverstein. As an adult, I have a whole new respect for his body of work!
Andrew.Toal posted on June 18, 2011
Weird! I just started piecing through this again myself.
In response to The Elements of Style
Miranda posted on June 18, 2011
dynamic interview. can’t wait to read the book!
In response to Rebecca Skloot on Keeping Her Book Alive
Clint posted on June 16, 2011
I love the title of this upcoming book by Liz Funk. I’m really interested in the subject matter as well.
In response to Oh, Crap – Home
Hanna Marlyn posted on June 16, 2011
Sitting in Dubai airport during an 8hr transit I faced some 20 people across the way – every single one busy with an ereader, phone or laptop/notebook. Not a single book in sight. My paperback fell to pieces, the glue having turned a bit old …makes you think.
In response to inTouch: Are E-Readers Dead?
Wendy posted on June 16, 2011
I can’t believe they’re re-making this movie! I just found this:
http://www.buzzsugar.com/Great-Gatsby-Movie-Full-Casting-List-16733638
Don’t like!
In response to The Great Gatsby
Liz.Funk posted on June 15, 2011
“The Great Gatsby” is probably the one novel that I read every year and never start to get sick of. It makes me want to get in a time machine and go back to eastern Long Island circa 1921 and then douse the time machine in water so I never have to leave.
Here’s my beef. I am NOT excited about the Great Gatsby movie. I think Baz Luhrmann butchered his 1996 take on “Romeo and Juliet” and rumor is that Blake Lively, of “Gossip Girl” is going to play Daisy. But I don’t think she’s quite sophisticated enough to take on such a nuanced character. The problem is, I can’t think of any other actress who I’d be happy to see play Daisy… except Meryl Streep. And that won’t work.
Am I just being cranky or does this movie already sound like it will do such an injustice to the perfect book?
In response to The Great Gatsby
Liz posted on June 15, 2011
Oh my Goodness, what a powerful interview. Kudos to Janet Garber for asking such good questions. I almost envy Jennifer Haigh because, as a writer, I find it immensely lonely and isolating, and sometimes I wish I had the personality that could succeed as a retail clerk or bank teller or some career that would have me interacting with people every minute of every day (or perhaps I wish I could be a loner, like Haigh, and just write and feel okay). Alas, I feel like Haigh in that I, too, can’t do anything but write!
Anyone have advice on this?
In response to Jennifer Haigh on Writing and Failing
Liz posted on June 15, 2011
TOO funny! And I think the intertextual approach, that the video and the images and the poems and the general wonky effects really make the words spring out at you.
In response to Video: A “Trippy” Reading by Ed Hirsch
Andrew.Toal posted on June 14, 2011
Loved Red Dead. I imagine I will love this game. Should at least tide me over until Mass Effect III.
In response to Free Read Pick: Short Story by Lawrence Block from L.A. Noire
Jane posted on June 14, 2011
I think they should focus more on electronic paper rather than wasting paper and trees. Just my point programmes tv
In response to Taking the Espresso Book Machine for a Test Drive
Liz posted on June 12, 2011
Becca, that’s a great point about YA getting dated, but imagine how dated today’s YA is going to seem… in 5 years! I feel like there is more product placement and mentioning of bands and brands and products that might not be as well known in the near future (and I feel like there was much, much less of that in Blume’s books).
In response to inTouch: Have Good YA Books Gone Bad?
Becca posted on June 11, 2011
I was just thinking the other night that an update for a lot of the great books we, and kids since the 60s, have read. Books like Are You There God? and Forever, deal with great subject matter, but are soooooo dated, especially for kids of today. They were dated when we were teens, but the world has evolved at a much greater pace than it did in the 80s. Time to re-write some Blume!
It is interesting that language is so free in YA books, but gets movies like The King’s Speech an R rating.
In response to inTouch: Have Good YA Books Gone Bad?
Jada Bradley posted on June 11, 2011
Your two cents is on the money. I love your scenario where someone tries to sell “Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret” in today’s market. I agree that there is a lot of escapist, high-concept YA out there.
All the more reason to support YA writers who want to change lives and to give them kudos for taking a collective stand when they felt like the entire industry was maligned.
In response to inTouch: Have Good YA Books Gone Bad?
Jada Bradley posted on June 11, 2011
The bookstore/eatery model can work and I hope they do well. In Washington DC, we have KramerBooks, a fixture in the Dupont Circle neighborhood and the more recent (and very successful) Busboys and Poets.
In response to America’s Best Independent Bookstores: Stories Books and Café
Liz posted on June 10, 2011
GREAT article. In fact, I like this reaction to the WSJ piece much better than I liked the original WSJ piece, so kudos to you! I have three main reactions to this discussion of contemporary YA.
1. I admire YA writers for how they collectively reacted to the WSJ article and took to Twitter and to their blogs and stood up for their industry (after all, YA today essentially is an industry). I also just generally admire YA writers; I think they’re the best at building a community around their work, using technology to promote themselves, and making themselves accessible to their fans.
2. However, I think a lot of YA today is just, well… crap. While the last chapters of most YA books (especially those geared towards girls) end on a note of accepting who you are, they’re really not relatable at all, because the protagonists either lead some kind of glamorous life or a double-life (as a princess, assassin, whatever…). I was reading this one YA fiction book in college–I’m straining to remember what the title was–and in one scene, these three teens in Manhattan for the summer were hanging out at the uber-trendy bar “Milk and Honey.” At the time, I was 20, and I was like, “OK, I have 3 fake IDs and none of them would work at Milk and Honey.” They even card obvious adults at Milk and Honey. And it’s little details like that, that add up to make a lot of today’s YA not at all relatable for today’s teens. It’s escapist–it doesn’t really reflect the teen experience.
3. However, this may not necessarily be the writers’ fault. There is such a push today to write very commercial high-concept YA fiction or YA fiction that can easily be parlayed into a series (presumably at the behest of publishers). Because of it, we’re really risking losing enduring teen literature. I think if an author tried to shop a book about a girl that moves from the city to the suburbs and struggles to come to terms with her religious beliefs and her bra size (“Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret”), publishers might say, “Cool… but what if she secretly fought zombies by night?”
My $.02.
In response to inTouch: Have Good YA Books Gone Bad?
Jada Bradley posted on June 6, 2011
I say read what you want and how you want, just read.
In response to inTouch: Are E-Readers Dead?
Becca posted on June 6, 2011
I’m sick of being told that I shouldn’t be carrying around books, I should have an e-reader. How about everyone just stfu and mind their own business? What’s it to the bartender what you read on?
In response to inTouch: Are E-Readers Dead?
Zev Averbach posted on June 5, 2011
Don’t forget Amis’s “Money” and Palahniuk’s “Fight Club.” The former is especially unreliable, as revealed by a switch of narrator midway through.
In response to Unreliable Narrator: A Round-up
Danielle posted on June 3, 2011
Beautiful. Thank you for articulating what I could not.
In response to inTribute: Gil Scott-Heron
David posted on June 3, 2011
`I guess action movie cliches would require it’s own seperate shape. So many there but I gotta go – there’s only 20 seconds left before the bomb goes off and I have to decide which wire to cut!
In response to Infographic: Trapezoid of Movie Clichés
Jada Bradley posted on June 3, 2011
That’s a good example. Thanks!
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books–low-hum–little-lo-humbert-humbert-narrator-of-lolita-is-a-sadist-narcissist-and-sexual-deviant-so-why-should-we-think-nabokovs-novel-morally-acceptable-1559472.html
In response to Unreliable Narrator: A Round-up
Jada Bradley posted on June 3, 2011
I got one as a gift and I love it!
In response to Books on Shirts. Shirts on a Mission.
Liz posted on June 3, 2011
I like lip-locking in the rain! There’s really nothing enduring about “The Notebook” movie, but that kiss will live on forever.
I also like “catch her at the station” because usually, in those scenes, the women are wearing amazing vintage outfits–swirling skirts and crepe-y scarves to protect their hair–and they’re carrying hatboxes. And then there’s usually a kiss, but not usually in the rain. So cute.
In response to Infographic: Trapezoid of Movie Clichés
David posted on June 3, 2011
hmmm . . . Lolita by Vladimir Nabakov. I think Humbert Humbert is a little of both types of narrator. Butt mostly Unknowingly in my opinion.
In response to Unreliable Narrator: A Round-up
alan holdgate posted on June 2, 2011
Hello
In the middle of worst case by James patterson what a brilliant read.
Have to read it again and again
Sharon M. posted on June 1, 2011
I’m still torn between the desire to dogear pages, and write in the margins – as opposed to caring a stack of books in one small device.
In response to inTouch: The Kindle, Unplugged
David posted on June 1, 2011
I like the smell of books much more than that of e-readers.
In response to inTouch: The Kindle, Unplugged
alan holdgate posted on May 30, 2011
brilliant story a bit harrowing I,m half way
Please send me you.re thoughts please
In response to Tell-tale
alan holdgate posted on May 29, 2011
Hello
I am in the middle of tell tale lovely story
Liz posted on May 27, 2011
Great article! Personally, if the right dude took me out for a nice dinner and then took me to the New York Public Library for reading/whispering in the Rose Reading Room and kissed me goodnight in front of the lions, I’d probably stick with him for awhile.
In response to How to Go on a Date at the Library
Sharon M. posted on May 26, 2011
Well, many people hope you’re right about Oprah continuing to influence reading in her new venture.
In response to inTouch: Dear Oprah, We Know This Isn’t Goodbye…
Andrew.Toal posted on May 26, 2011
Michael Schaub already said it better: http://www.npr.org/2011/02/03/133409706/in-deus-a-glimpse-of-the-reality-tv-pocalypse
In response to Deus Ex Machina
Andrew.Toal posted on May 26, 2011
Sound advice, even for old timers.
In response to The Art of Fiction, Notes on Craft for Young Writers
Felicia.Pride posted on May 26, 2011
This sounds pretty interesting.
In response to Change by design, how design thinking transforms organizations and inspires innovation
inReads posted on May 26, 2011
Ah, dilemmas, dilemmas!
In response to Reading Video Games: 5 Literary Tropes Found in Gaming
Laura.Caseley posted on May 25, 2011
This is really interesting. I’ve heard a great deal about both the pros and cons of self-publishing. But I still have quite a bit of time before I’m ready for that step.
In response to DIY: A Poet E-Publishes and Lives to Tell the Tale
Andrew.Toal posted on May 25, 2011
While playing Knights of the Old Republic some years ago, I had to stop playing for a couple of days to decide whether I should join the Dark Side and reclaim my mantle of Dark Lord. I was bartending at the time, and asked pretty much everyone who came in what I should do. In the end, I had to do what was right for the galaxy. The Jedi never knew what hit them.
In response to Reading Video Games: 5 Literary Tropes Found in Gaming
Katharine.Scott posted on May 25, 2011
I wanted to read this play because I watched the film and it was awesome! It stars Julia Roberts, Natalie Portman, Jude Law, and Clive Owen. It starts off a bit like a love story, but I assure you it’s more than that. This film, based upon Marber’s play, really makes you think about relationships, love, fidelity, honesty and deception. While watching it I just knew it had to be based upon a piece of literature because every line was thoughtfully crafted…no filler cliche phrases. I thought that by reading, I could see how the play and film compare and satisfy my inner English nerd. Adaptations are always so fun to analayze!
In response to Closer
inReads posted on May 24, 2011
Thanks, Liz!
In response to Welcome to inReads: Let the Conversation Begin!
Liz posted on May 24, 2011
Kudos to Felicia, Michael, and WETA for having the vision, ambition, and guts to launch such an important venture!
In response to Welcome to inReads: Let the Conversation Begin!
Felicia.Pride posted on May 24, 2011
hmm…
In response to The Myth of Innate Genius: David Shenk’s New Book, The Genius in All Of Us – The Daily Beast
Clint posted on May 16, 2011
I love this book!
In response to The design of everyday things