Reviewing the Mail: Week of 1/2/2021

Just one book this week: it did come in the mail, but not as a publicity title. I paid for it, more or less, since it was part of a larger package that a jokey oath says I'm not supposed to talk about. [1]

Cease & Desist is more of an art object than a book -- it contains 90 images by LA-based visual artist and screenwriter Todd Alcott based on the lyrics and album covers (and, occasionally, faces) of the band They Might Be Giants. I think everything is a pre-existing manipulated image, rather than brand-new things, mostly from the mid-20th century. There's lots of retouched photos of other bands, old paperbacks with new titles, advertising pieces, toys and similar ephemera, and so on. It's in a nice hardcover package, suitable for leaving on the coffee table of somewhere much hipper than my house.

I may post again about it when I actually "read" it -- again, it's more an art thing than a book to be read, and I've poked through a bunch of it already.

I don't think it's going to be widely available. I do not have a link to share with you, where you could purchase it. As I said, it was part of a specific package at a specific time, and that window closed in time for the book to have a print run set and for this book to get to me (and to however many other people) from China. The ISBN is 9780578633886, if you are a massive TMBG or Todd Alcott fan and didn't hear about it until just this moment.

By the way, Alcott has an Etsy store with lots of stuff (mostly prints) in this style based on other bands -- including a couple for TMBG -- and much of it is deeply awesome. (If I were buying one for myself, it would likely be Life During Wartime.)

[1] "Oh, I don't know. You must be thinking of some other band."