I've been reading Tim Lucas's magazine Video Watchdog for over a decade now. Looking at their back issues online, I think it was issue 51, the May/June 1999 issue with 2001's Keir Dulla on the cover.
It was around that time that I was really getting into DVD and I was looking for reviews of films I should watch. Video Watchdog with it's coverage of "fantastic films" seemed to be exactly what I needed as it covered every genre imaginable. Each issue was an eduction in the obscure and the obscurities of the obscure with intelligence, clarity and most importantly passion.
When I was not able to reliably find issues on the stands anymore, I started a subscription, which aside from a brief bout with unemployment, I've kept fairly regularly.
One of the effects of having followed one man and one woman's passion for so long, you begin to be granted glimpses into their life. One of the things I learned was of a novel Tim Lucas wrote called Throat Sprockets, which started out in comic anthology Taboo (a book I would have loved to have read when it was coming out, but was always too expensive or too hard to find in those pre-internet days).
The book deals with an advertiser who sees an obscure erotic film and becomes obsessed with it.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Book 11: The Terror
Finally finished this last night. It took far longer than I anticipated. It was a quick read and when I was able to find time to actually devote to it, I would be able to knock out fifty pages or so in a sitting.
The dilemma was that I was rarely able to find that time beyond my commute and right before falling asleep.
There's really not a lot I can say about this book. There's so much there, but it seems to be written as though much of it is inconsequential. The various deaths of good men, of bad men and the like.
What I really, REALLY enjoyed was the final 60 pages where the book veers wildly in tone to present the cosmology and world creation myth of the Eskimo. It was these folklore and epic bits which really tied everything together to present an excellent ending which while unexpected fit in perfectly with what had come before. The final mystery of The Lady Silence, the Eskimo woman they had picked up on the ice was handled perfectly well.
I feel quite remiss in not having read more of his works and want to add Dan Simmons's newest, Drood, to the pile.
But not yet.
Not yet.
The dilemma was that I was rarely able to find that time beyond my commute and right before falling asleep.
There's really not a lot I can say about this book. There's so much there, but it seems to be written as though much of it is inconsequential. The various deaths of good men, of bad men and the like.
What I really, REALLY enjoyed was the final 60 pages where the book veers wildly in tone to present the cosmology and world creation myth of the Eskimo. It was these folklore and epic bits which really tied everything together to present an excellent ending which while unexpected fit in perfectly with what had come before. The final mystery of The Lady Silence, the Eskimo woman they had picked up on the ice was handled perfectly well.
I feel quite remiss in not having read more of his works and want to add Dan Simmons's newest, Drood, to the pile.
But not yet.
Not yet.
Monday, February 23, 2009
Interlude: I'm lazy
In re-reading some of my past posts I see just how lazy a "reviewer" I actually am.
Sorry!
I mean to write more and include relevant passages from the books I am currently reading but I am often writing while at work and essentially pulling double duty. The issue with this is that something grand and winding like The Terror boils down to: "it good" as though that were enough to properly convey my feelings on the topics of these books.
I don't really feel to guilty when covering books like The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, because it has a rather expansive wikipedia entry, but then you go on to look at The Terror for example it just boasts a few paragraphs which read like solicitation from a catalog rather than anything meaningful.
Anyway, I have been reading my current book for what feels like forever and I am really looking forward to wrapping it up and moving on.
I have a few options at hand. All Heads Turn as the Hunt Goes By, The Earth Abides and Throat Sprockets have all been looking rather good to me, but then I also have a few Graham Greene short story collections that I would like to cram in. Perhaps the rather short stories will act as a good counter balance to the ballast of my current selection.
Sorry!
I mean to write more and include relevant passages from the books I am currently reading but I am often writing while at work and essentially pulling double duty. The issue with this is that something grand and winding like The Terror boils down to: "it good" as though that were enough to properly convey my feelings on the topics of these books.
I don't really feel to guilty when covering books like The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, because it has a rather expansive wikipedia entry, but then you go on to look at The Terror for example it just boasts a few paragraphs which read like solicitation from a catalog rather than anything meaningful.
Anyway, I have been reading my current book for what feels like forever and I am really looking forward to wrapping it up and moving on.
I have a few options at hand. All Heads Turn as the Hunt Goes By, The Earth Abides and Throat Sprockets have all been looking rather good to me, but then I also have a few Graham Greene short story collections that I would like to cram in. Perhaps the rather short stories will act as a good counter balance to the ballast of my current selection.
interlude: Thanks, NPR
From NPR today.
Then she goes on to praise the Twilight series.
Come on. Really? REALLY?
As opposed to all of those cutting edge Booker Prize award winners.
All writers are grave robbers, but genre fiction writers are the most brazen of all. Of necessity, to write a romance or mystery or horror story means sticking to the narrow confines of a formulaic plot; exhuming stock character types; and, generally, digging up literary turf that's been worked and reworked to the point of exhaustion
Then she goes on to praise the Twilight series.
Both Meyers and Simmons are inventive inheritors of the tale of terror, but Myers is the writer who really proves that "The Undead" is a term that refers not just to vampires, but to the supernatural genre itself.
Come on. Really? REALLY?
New Book: The Terror
I've been fan of Dan Simmons since I read Children of the Night back in the early 90s. I enjoyed the blend of fact and fiction to try to present a new take on the Vlad Tepes history, a discussion of Romania after the collapse of Communism and got to learn all kinds of new and exciting blood terminology.
I've gone on to read some of his other famous works like Carrion Comfort, Song of Kali, and Lovedeath. He is also famously known for Hyperion and and Ilium, which I haven't read, because I tend to avoid pastiches without having read the original source material.
The Terror is the story of the failed Franklin expedition to find the North West Passage in the 1840s. The story is told through the eyes of many different characters, from mutinous malcontents, to ships officers, to marines. Each of our "Main" characters have expansive backstory. The character we spend the most amount of time with (so far) is Captain Crozier of the sister ship The Terror with a wonderful blending of factual detail, fictional detail and plot to propell the story forward.
I'm about 700 pages in out of 1000 and the story is wrapping up nicely. I've heard that the book dissolves at the end, but so far, this is quite enjoyable.
I've gone on to read some of his other famous works like Carrion Comfort, Song of Kali, and Lovedeath. He is also famously known for Hyperion and and Ilium, which I haven't read, because I tend to avoid pastiches without having read the original source material.
The Terror is the story of the failed Franklin expedition to find the North West Passage in the 1840s. The story is told through the eyes of many different characters, from mutinous malcontents, to ships officers, to marines. Each of our "Main" characters have expansive backstory. The character we spend the most amount of time with (so far) is Captain Crozier of the sister ship The Terror with a wonderful blending of factual detail, fictional detail and plot to propell the story forward.
I'm about 700 pages in out of 1000 and the story is wrapping up nicely. I've heard that the book dissolves at the end, but so far, this is quite enjoyable.
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Book 10: The Man on the Balcony
The book opens with a man on a balcony watching children at play. He glances over to notice another man.
This other man is a professional mugger. He has been comitting a rash of muggings in the area. He is careful taking great pains to observe his targets. To make certain the timing is "safe" to make certain the target is wealthy to make certain he can get away.
The mugger is a major concern for the police of Stockholm and as such he's a concern for Inspector Martin Beck and the men of his department.
Until the dead girl appears. Raped, strangled and no pants.
Then the hunt is on for the new menace.
This is the third book in Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo's Martin Beck mysteries series entitled A Story of Crime. Once more the book is a look at specific social issues with occasional policework, but this time the story is incredilby well done. Whereas the previous two books were told only from Beck's POV, this book has a shifting series of characters who see different things, think differently about the same things, and all make up important aspects of the story.
I was constantly wowed by this book, especially when contextualized against the previous works. I have the fourth book, The Laughing Policeman, ready to go, and it's routinely called the best of the series but I'm holding off on reading it for now.
I also found out while doing a bit of research on this book that the authors were life long leftists. This was something I didn't really pick up on during the reading of these books, but now that I know that, it does make sense.
This other man is a professional mugger. He has been comitting a rash of muggings in the area. He is careful taking great pains to observe his targets. To make certain the timing is "safe" to make certain the target is wealthy to make certain he can get away.
The mugger is a major concern for the police of Stockholm and as such he's a concern for Inspector Martin Beck and the men of his department.
Until the dead girl appears. Raped, strangled and no pants.
Then the hunt is on for the new menace.
This is the third book in Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo's Martin Beck mysteries series entitled A Story of Crime. Once more the book is a look at specific social issues with occasional policework, but this time the story is incredilby well done. Whereas the previous two books were told only from Beck's POV, this book has a shifting series of characters who see different things, think differently about the same things, and all make up important aspects of the story.
I was constantly wowed by this book, especially when contextualized against the previous works. I have the fourth book, The Laughing Policeman, ready to go, and it's routinely called the best of the series but I'm holding off on reading it for now.
I also found out while doing a bit of research on this book that the authors were life long leftists. This was something I didn't really pick up on during the reading of these books, but now that I know that, it does make sense.
Friday, February 13, 2009
Interlude
In the few days I've been away I have finished one book and gotten nearly two hundred pages into the next one but I've just not found time to write up my views on the EXCELLENT book, The Man on the Balcony.
I've also started the longest book for this project so far, Dan Simmon's 2007 historical horror book, The Terror, about an aborted attempt to locate the northwest passage in 1845. It's about 910 pages and I'm about 200 pages in or so.
I've also started the longest book for this project so far, Dan Simmon's 2007 historical horror book, The Terror, about an aborted attempt to locate the northwest passage in 1845. It's about 910 pages and I'm about 200 pages in or so.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Book 9: The Savage Season
I wrapped this last night. Very enjoyable. As always the enjoyable things from these books is Hap's internal monologue and the interplay between himself and Leonard.
Here's an abbreviated plot synopsis from wikipedia
Here's an abbreviated plot synopsis from wikipedia
Hap and Leonard are two Texan men who are down on their luck, both working low paying jobs well into their 40's. A former girlfriend of Hap's returns, involving the pair in a scheme to retrieve hundreds of thousands of dollars stolen from a bank and then lost in a creek in the woods in an area which Hap knows quite well. She is involved with a small group of radical leftists who wish to use the money to fund their movement; Hap and Leonard just wish to have enough to retire somewhere pleasant. Her return, as well as her continued involvement with various movement, awakens dormant emotions in Hap, leading him to wonder whether he should have devoted more time to the ideals he felt in the '60's, and whether he had wasted his time in the interim on low-paying, go nowhere jobs.
Monday, February 9, 2009
New Book: The Savage Season
I love Joe R Lansdale's writing and I will read damn near anything he writes just because he wrote it. I've read quite a few of his short story collections by different publishers, I try to check in on the free story he puts online, I'll read the comics he wrote and I'll even manage to slog through works of his I don't really like just so I can get to the interesting bits (like Drive-In 2).
Quite a few years ago I found myself without a job for a short bit so I did what any self-respecting man of newly found leisure would do. I went to my local library and read a lot while waiting for job leads to come in or interviews or the like.
I used a lot of this time to go through and finally read some of the authors I'd heard of but never read, like Philip K Dick, Shirley Jackson, F. Paul Wilson, and then I went through and read some older classical stuff like Oliver Onions, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu and the like.
One of the authors I also took the time to read more of was Joe R Lansdale and I got to really get into the breadth of his writing. One of the things I discovered was his Hap and Leonard stories. A series of novels about a pair of East Texas... vigilantes, shit kickers, I don't know if there's really a word for it. Men of sometimes reluctant but furious violence.
My library had most of the books, but not, frustratingly enough, the first one. So when browsing the local mystery section, I found that Black Lizard/Vintage crime is bringing the books back into print, I was elated because I knew there were books I hadn't yet read from this series and now I'd get the chance.
So far, with this book, our first person narrator, Hap has had The Old Flame With A Plea For Help appear in the form of Trudy a flame from the late 60s. There's a million dollars at the bottom of a river and Hap knows the location, while Leonard knows how to dive. There's a crew that already exists to get the money but I've just met them on page 50 so I don't have much in the way to tell you about them, but they're certainly eccentrics in the typical Joe R Lansdale stye.
Quite a few years ago I found myself without a job for a short bit so I did what any self-respecting man of newly found leisure would do. I went to my local library and read a lot while waiting for job leads to come in or interviews or the like.
I used a lot of this time to go through and finally read some of the authors I'd heard of but never read, like Philip K Dick, Shirley Jackson, F. Paul Wilson, and then I went through and read some older classical stuff like Oliver Onions, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu and the like.
One of the authors I also took the time to read more of was Joe R Lansdale and I got to really get into the breadth of his writing. One of the things I discovered was his Hap and Leonard stories. A series of novels about a pair of East Texas... vigilantes, shit kickers, I don't know if there's really a word for it. Men of sometimes reluctant but furious violence.
My library had most of the books, but not, frustratingly enough, the first one. So when browsing the local mystery section, I found that Black Lizard/Vintage crime is bringing the books back into print, I was elated because I knew there were books I hadn't yet read from this series and now I'd get the chance.
So far, with this book, our first person narrator, Hap has had The Old Flame With A Plea For Help appear in the form of Trudy a flame from the late 60s. There's a million dollars at the bottom of a river and Hap knows the location, while Leonard knows how to dive. There's a crew that already exists to get the money but I've just met them on page 50 so I don't have much in the way to tell you about them, but they're certainly eccentrics in the typical Joe R Lansdale stye.
Book 8: Faceless Killers
Wrapped this last night and found it to be quite enjoyable. Mankell's prose (or at least the translation thereof) was simple, perhaps even deceptively so.
Overall it was a very good police procedural and reading many of these in a row really makes one realize just how much of policing appears to be leaps of logic and luck rather than following paths through to the end.
This is very good, so I will probably read a few more in the series. I'm a little concerned with the silliness presented in the BBC series because it doesn't seem like it carries over to the books, but who knows. They may go a bit insane later on.
Overall it was a very good police procedural and reading many of these in a row really makes one realize just how much of policing appears to be leaps of logic and luck rather than following paths through to the end.
This is very good, so I will probably read a few more in the series. I'm a little concerned with the silliness presented in the BBC series because it doesn't seem like it carries over to the books, but who knows. They may go a bit insane later on.
Friday, February 6, 2009
New Book: Faceless Killers
I'm currently reading Faceless Killers the first book in Henning Mankell's Inspector Wallander series of books spurred largely because of the recent BBC series (three hour and a half long episodes based on three of the books in the series). I found the TV shows to be pretty good but a bit goofy in places, and found each episode's plot to get progressively and somewhat exponentially better. As the semi-promised second series is on hold while actor Kenneth Brannagh directs Thor for Marvel Entertainment (a somewhat safe and wholly American choice considering the amount of goofy faux Ye Olde English coming from Norsemen in the comics and Brannagh's Shakespearean background), I figured now would be a good time to keep interest up and dive in.
Kurt Wallander is an archetype to the point of stereotype in the detective/police genre. The man who is married to his job and as such loses his family. The good man caught up in a frustrating system, and on and on. He drinks too much, eats to little and when he does eat makes what nutritionists would deem Bad Choices, and works much harder than he should.
In the early morning of January in 1990, an elderly couple is murdered in their bed with the only clue being the last words of the wife's "foreign."
This leads to basically a narrative examination of racism, immigration policy, refugee camps, and political maneuvering between the various branches of government and police.
There is some really good interplay between Wallander and the other characters but not with witty bon mots.
I'm trying to find and articulate the commonalities between Wallander, Martin Beck and Aurelio Zen but am having a bit of a time trying to do so. They are nearly interchangeable and I can't quite tell if this is because of the authors, the genre or the characters.
Perhaps it will come to me.
Kurt Wallander is an archetype to the point of stereotype in the detective/police genre. The man who is married to his job and as such loses his family. The good man caught up in a frustrating system, and on and on. He drinks too much, eats to little and when he does eat makes what nutritionists would deem Bad Choices, and works much harder than he should.
In the early morning of January in 1990, an elderly couple is murdered in their bed with the only clue being the last words of the wife's "foreign."
This leads to basically a narrative examination of racism, immigration policy, refugee camps, and political maneuvering between the various branches of government and police.
There is some really good interplay between Wallander and the other characters but not with witty bon mots.
I'm trying to find and articulate the commonalities between Wallander, Martin Beck and Aurelio Zen but am having a bit of a time trying to do so. They are nearly interchangeable and I can't quite tell if this is because of the authors, the genre or the characters.
Perhaps it will come to me.
Book 7: Portnoy's Complaint
Wrapped this a few days ago and went back and reread the last 100 pages last night so that I could refresh my memory for this write up.
Ultimately the book was about relationships and identity. Alexander Portnoy through a series of monologues tells tales of growing up in a Jewish community in 40s, his sexual awakening (rarely would I use the term with men. men don't seem to "awaken" slowly like women's sexuality in fiction, but it seems to spring fully formed and seemingly out of control. With men it's more of a sexual suppression so that you can function as a member of society) and his interactions with a series of women.
Starting with his mother. Very stereotypical but I understand that it's true to life for a number of of people. Overbearing with good intention and insane with potential worries (there is an extended segment about a conversation wherein Portnoy's parents beg him to not ride in a convertable car and list all the ways in which he could be crippled or murdered). There is a degree of sexual fear which comes from his mother's overbearing attitude and abnormal normality with regards to body issues and boundries.
There is also The Monkey, based loosely on the author's first wife. This is a non-Jewish woman from a West Virginia coal mining town who fled there to go to Vegas (where she may or may not have been a whore, Portnoy is an unreliable narrator), who went to NYC who Portnoy managed to pick up off the street. She's sexually adventurous and willing to please but also undereducated which makes Portnoy have a air of superiority (sections talking about how she was going to be his project that he would teach her to hate her ancestors for what WASPs have done to other races and religions). She is unhappy, Portnoy is unhappy and because Portnoy refuses to treat her as anything other than how he sees her, he takes out his aggravation on her, which causes her to retreat (multiple suicide attempts and the like) until they split.
To inform the reaction to The Monkey, there is a segment wherein Portnoy discusses his first college girlfriend, The Pumpkin (so named for her ass). She's from the Midwest, intelligent, articulate, educated, and pretty much perfect except she won't go down on Portnoy, so he savagely sabotages the relationship which causes it to end. She is probably the most balanced woman he could have had and his own pomposity doesn't let him see it.
There is a final segment which is a trip to Israel in the 60s, where in he meets and falls in love with the final woman, an American by birth whose family moved to Israel during the postwar Exodus so she is slightly foreign and very socialist. Portnoy surrounded by Jews for the first time since his childhood goes a little bit mad and falls in love with and attempts to rape this woman when she refuses to marry him.
I stand by my original assessment that the book is a bit overlong perhaps by about 25-50 pages. I would have liked to have focused a bit more on his life outside of the sexual longing and even stronger the reconciliation of self perceived sense of "self" versus who he actually is.
Of course, in our autobiographies, we are all the hero.
If you have few days, give it a read. It's alternatively horrific and hilarious and to me it struck bit close to home.
Ultimately the book was about relationships and identity. Alexander Portnoy through a series of monologues tells tales of growing up in a Jewish community in 40s, his sexual awakening (rarely would I use the term with men. men don't seem to "awaken" slowly like women's sexuality in fiction, but it seems to spring fully formed and seemingly out of control. With men it's more of a sexual suppression so that you can function as a member of society) and his interactions with a series of women.
Starting with his mother. Very stereotypical but I understand that it's true to life for a number of of people. Overbearing with good intention and insane with potential worries (there is an extended segment about a conversation wherein Portnoy's parents beg him to not ride in a convertable car and list all the ways in which he could be crippled or murdered). There is a degree of sexual fear which comes from his mother's overbearing attitude and abnormal normality with regards to body issues and boundries.
There is also The Monkey, based loosely on the author's first wife. This is a non-Jewish woman from a West Virginia coal mining town who fled there to go to Vegas (where she may or may not have been a whore, Portnoy is an unreliable narrator), who went to NYC who Portnoy managed to pick up off the street. She's sexually adventurous and willing to please but also undereducated which makes Portnoy have a air of superiority (sections talking about how she was going to be his project that he would teach her to hate her ancestors for what WASPs have done to other races and religions). She is unhappy, Portnoy is unhappy and because Portnoy refuses to treat her as anything other than how he sees her, he takes out his aggravation on her, which causes her to retreat (multiple suicide attempts and the like) until they split.
To inform the reaction to The Monkey, there is a segment wherein Portnoy discusses his first college girlfriend, The Pumpkin (so named for her ass). She's from the Midwest, intelligent, articulate, educated, and pretty much perfect except she won't go down on Portnoy, so he savagely sabotages the relationship which causes it to end. She is probably the most balanced woman he could have had and his own pomposity doesn't let him see it.
There is a final segment which is a trip to Israel in the 60s, where in he meets and falls in love with the final woman, an American by birth whose family moved to Israel during the postwar Exodus so she is slightly foreign and very socialist. Portnoy surrounded by Jews for the first time since his childhood goes a little bit mad and falls in love with and attempts to rape this woman when she refuses to marry him.
I stand by my original assessment that the book is a bit overlong perhaps by about 25-50 pages. I would have liked to have focused a bit more on his life outside of the sexual longing and even stronger the reconciliation of self perceived sense of "self" versus who he actually is.
Of course, in our autobiographies, we are all the hero.
If you have few days, give it a read. It's alternatively horrific and hilarious and to me it struck bit close to home.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Interlude: argh
Life has gotten in the way so I haven't had a chance to write up my thoughts on Portnoy's Complaint, which I wrapped and ultimately found a too long for too little for what's actually in the book and I've started on Henning Mankell's Faceless Killers, the first in his Kurt Wallander series.
Monday, February 2, 2009
New Book: Portnoy's Complaint
Portnoy's Complaint or Sex: The Sexing started off as a series of dinner party monologues by Philip Roth which dipped into autobiographical territory and it shows.
It's the story of one Alexander Portnoy and his life history as relayed in a series of couch sessions to a psychiatrist. It is at turns, vulgar, hilarious, depressing, disgusting, uplifting and educational. Basically, it's life as a man. Though I must confess I don't quite possess the same libidinous strength that the book's main character seemingly does.
It's entertainingly told and so far reads very quickly, but my main issue is with the structure of the book. It's done as a series of Psychiatric monologues but the length of these "sessions" varies wildly. I wish that it had kept to a specific rhythm with call backs to previous session rather than expanded stories.
Beyond the sex, the book also goes into life as a Jew in prewar New Jersey, or at least as it relates to this small section of Newark. His mother is essentially the mother from hell. Excessively doting and well intentioned but quite overbearing (with specific reference to Freud on Leonardo) and the painting of this as an issue for all Jewish mothers of a certain social strata in that time period within this community (driving one's child to suicide).
My own exposure with Jewish mothers is limited. I think I know exactly one and her children are too young to psychoanalyze for sexual misconduct, though hilariously one of her children, still of nursing age, did spend an inordinate amount of time staring at my girlfriend's breasts while we were at dinner with them.
That's ok, because I tend to do the same thing.
It's the story of one Alexander Portnoy and his life history as relayed in a series of couch sessions to a psychiatrist. It is at turns, vulgar, hilarious, depressing, disgusting, uplifting and educational. Basically, it's life as a man. Though I must confess I don't quite possess the same libidinous strength that the book's main character seemingly does.
It's entertainingly told and so far reads very quickly, but my main issue is with the structure of the book. It's done as a series of Psychiatric monologues but the length of these "sessions" varies wildly. I wish that it had kept to a specific rhythm with call backs to previous session rather than expanded stories.
Beyond the sex, the book also goes into life as a Jew in prewar New Jersey, or at least as it relates to this small section of Newark. His mother is essentially the mother from hell. Excessively doting and well intentioned but quite overbearing (with specific reference to Freud on Leonardo) and the painting of this as an issue for all Jewish mothers of a certain social strata in that time period within this community (driving one's child to suicide).
My own exposure with Jewish mothers is limited. I think I know exactly one and her children are too young to psychoanalyze for sexual misconduct, though hilariously one of her children, still of nursing age, did spend an inordinate amount of time staring at my girlfriend's breasts while we were at dinner with them.
That's ok, because I tend to do the same thing.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
