Obsessing Again

Off and on yesterday, I wrote a long post, but forgot to actually post it before turning off my home computer last night.

And so now I'm trying to decide what to do with it. It's way too long, and probably pointless. On the other hand, I did spend too much time writing and thinking about it to just trash it. But, on the third hand, it's about something potentially embarrassing. On the fourth hand...

Oh, what the hell. It'll be up next.

Quote of the Week

"Conservative men are crazy to start with, so they can relax and be secure in the knowledge that things cannot possibly get any worse. The liberal man, however, is merely neurotic, so he knows full well that something more is looming out there if he is not careful."
- Florence King, from He: An Irreverent Look at the American Male

Just Read: Lemons Never Lie by Richard Stark

I've been reading a lot of Westlake recently -- Adios, Scheherezade under his own name, then I Know a Trick Worth Two of That as Samuel Holt and now this one as Richard Stark. Stark's books are mostly the "Parker" crime novels, but this is a sidebar novel, in a slightly less gritty style (but only slightly) about another criminal, Alan Grofield.

Grofield is an acquaintance of Parker's, so there clearly is a Stark-iverse (sorry; I put everything in comic-book terms; it's a sickness). I understand that there are several Grofield novels, but this is the first one I've read. (And I have no idea where this fits in Grofield continuity -- it probably slots in after some specific Parker book, too, and I don't know which that is.)

Lemons is about Grofield going to do a job, finding out the guy organizing that job is a few crates shy of a full load, and trying to get out. Being that this is a Richard Stark book, things are not that easy.

This was originally published in 1971; I got it in the new Hard Case Crime edition, which is snazzy and pulp-y as it should be (kudos to Charles Ardai for all those great Hard Case books). I still prefer trade paperbacks to mass-markets, but books like this can almost convince me otherwise.

Fanboys Spring Eternal

The best thing I've read today: if the Globe Theater had an Internet message board.

A sample:

Ugh, you think the Julius Caesar continuity is bad? Falstaff fucking disappears between the second part of of Henry IV and the start of Henry V! It's like WS forgot all about him!

I Am So Smart! I Am So Smart! S-M-R-T!

In my office this morning, Ellen Asher (my boss and Queen of All SF) were talking about a particular novel published by Tor, and speculating about that book's editor.

(We have seen a bound galley of this book, but the editor wasn't credited there. This could be significant -- Tor credits editors, but only if they want to be credited, and then editors must be credited in all of their books -- or not, since the whole point of galleys is that they're full of errors.)

After much thought, roving through our mental lists of the myriad Tor editors (sub-species On-Staff and Consulting), we both thought it would be one specific editor...and we were right.

Just read: Mouse Tales by David Koenig

This is an unauthorized history of and look behind the scenes at Disneyland; it's obvious Koenig has done a lot of research (both in books and from interviewing a lot of former and current Disney employees) and that Koenig has a lot of affection for Disneyland.

I've only been to Disneyland once (last summer, sneaking away from Worldcon), so I'm certainly no expert on it. But a behind-the-scenes look at any big amusement park (or other business strongly focused on keeping the customers happy) is interesting simply because interesting things happen to people in places like that, and Koenig does dig out a lot of good stories.

(I note that some people claim that Koenig is either peddling deliberate falsehoods or has been hoodwinked by hoaxers. Obviously, these people are ignoring the events backed up by legal records, since as the deaths, accidents and other mishaps, and also that they are unaware of the things that young energetic people will get up to when working together in a high-energy situation. Sure, I wouldn't be surprised if a couple of the stories in here are apocryphal, but I expect that things like them did happen.)

I'm quite interested in books about things that don't work out according to plan -- whether they're physical-failure books like Petroski's To Engineer Is Human or why-do-people-act-like-that books like Underhill's Why We Buy. And this is very much in that vein; Disneyland has been engineered and designed over the years, to eliminate all randomness or error...but, where you have people, you'll have the unexpected. So this book is of interest to more than just people who grew up in Southern California and went to Disneyland all the time -- though I do expect they'll love it, and were probably the first audience (it's published by a very small, SoCal press).

Movie Log: Possession

The Wife and I watched Possession a couple of nights ago; I wanted to see it because I'd read the Booker Prize-winning novel it was based on some time ago (back in the mid-90s, I think, a couple of years after it won).

My memory of the book is very hazy, but I'm pretty sure there was a lot more to it, and especially a lot more of the 19th century plotline. (Of course, a 500-page book has vastly more room for such things than a two-hour movie.)

Possession is a very watchable movie, though I kept expecting Aaron Eckhart to turn into a bastard, since practically every other part he's had over the past decade has been That Bastard. (He never does, if anyone else has that same problem.) We've got two plotlines in this movie -- Eckhart and Gwyneth Paltrow in the modern day as English lit scholars tracking down 19th century secrets, and Jeremy Northam and Jennifer Ehle as the 19th century originals whose secrets we learn about.

Possession is that oddest of things: a movie for people who like to read a lot. Many of the "dramatic" scenes are of Eckhart and Paltrow reading at each other, or at least begin and end that way. Besides the fact that the 19th century folks are poets (since that doesn't actually come into the plot much), the story is driven by people poking through archives, reading old letters, and doing close readings. It's practically an Oxbridge recruitment film.

It was promoted as a romance, which makes sense: it's about two love stories a century and a half apart. But neither plot is a genre romance in the Hollywood sense; the movie does stay close enough to the book to ensure that. So it's a good movie for people who like books, and don't mind a decent love story, but can't stand "romance." (Like me, for instance.)

Image Meme

I got this one from Poppy Z. Brite.

Plug your answers into Google Image Search and post the first image that comes up.

(I added captions to the ones that might be opaque.)

1. Your age on your next birthday.


2. Your favorite color:


3. Your middle name:

"Colin"

4. The last meal you ate:


5. Your bad habit:

"obsessing"

6. Your favorite fruit or vegetable:


7. Your favorite animal:

"pet rock"

8. The town you live in:


9. The name of your pet or last pet:


10. Your SO or best friend's nickname:

"la contessa"

12. Your crush's name:

"no such thing"

13. Your occupation:

"editor"

14. Your birth city:

"albany"

15. Your favorite song:

"it's not"
(Yes, there is no #11. I'm not sure if that's deliberate or not.)

Just Read: The Push Man and Other Stories by Yoshihiro Tatsumi

This was the first collection of Tatsumi's stories to be published in the US (aside from a smaller collection, nearly twenty years ago, of stories re-translated from Spanish and published by a Spanish publisher), and the first in the Drawn & Quarterly series. I came to it after reading Abandon the Old in Tokyo, the second D&Q book, last year.

This book covers Tatsumi's best stories from 1969, as Abandon did for 1970, and the stories are are generally shorter and a little less assured than those in Abandon were. This is still excellent, serious, adult work -- different from anything else I've seen from the manga world -- but it's clear Tatsumi was still finding his way at this point.

I think I'd recommend starting here rather than with Abandon, since this book would seem more impressive read first -- and then Abandon will be even better than that. If you read the kind of people published by D&Q, Fantagraphics, and that crowd -- preferably the folks who aren't completely obsessed with their own mixed-up lives -- you'll probably be amazed that Tatsumi was doing many of the same things (and doing them well) thirty-five years ago on the other side of the world.

And now I can hardly wait until September, when presumably D&Q will bring out the collection of stories from 1971...

My Son, Vince Lombardi

The scene: Thing 2 is coming out of kindergarten today, several kids back in the line, with a stern look on his face.

Thing 2: I was last!
Grandma: No you weren't; you were fifth.
Thing 2: I wasn't first!

I have no idea where he gets it from, but my younger son is fiercely competitive.

National Poetry Month Meme

I see from Keith DeCandido that this is National Poetry Month. To mark the occasion, he posted one of his favorite poems, which I think is a fine idea. (He's planning to keep doing it every Sunday this month, but I'm not committing to any more than one.)

So here's one of my favorites (I had big chunks of it memorized at one point), "Terrence, This Is Stupid Stuff" by A.E. Housman

‘Terence, this is stupid stuff:
You eat your victuals fast enough;
There can’t be much amiss, ’tis clear,
To see the rate you drink your beer.
But oh, good Lord, the verse you make,
It gives a chap the belly-ache.
The cow, the old cow, she is dead;
It sleeps well, the horned head:
We poor lads, ’tis our turn now.
To hear such tunes as killed the cow!
Pretty friendship 'tis to rhyme
Your friends to death before their time
Moping melancholy mad!
Come, pipe a tune to dance to, lad!"

Why, if 'tis dancing you would be,
There's brisker pipes than poetry.
Say, for what were hop-yards meant,
Or why was Burton built on Trent?
Oh many a peer of England brews
Livelier liquor than the Muse,
And malt does more than Milton can
To justify God's ways to man.
Ale, man, ale's the stuff to drink
For fellows whom it hurts to think:
Look into the pewter pot
To see the world as the world's not.
And faith, 'tis pleasant till 'tis past:
The mischief is that 'twill not last.
Oh I have been to Ludlow fair
And left my necktie God knows where,
And carried half way home, or near,
Pints and quarts of Ludlow beer:
Then the world seemed none so bad,
And I myself a sterling lad;
And down in lovely muck I've lain,
Happy till I woke again.
Then I saw the morning sky:
Heigho, the tale was all a lie;
The world, it was the old world yet,
I was I, my things were wet,
And nothing now remained to do
But begin the game anew.

Therefore, since the world has still
Much good, but much less good than ill,
And while the sun and moon endure
Luck's a chance, but trouble's sure,
I'd face it as a wise man would,
And train for ill and not for good.
'Tis true, the stuff I bring for sale
Is not so brisk a brew as ale:
Out of a stem that scored the hand
I wrung it in a weary land.
But take it: if the smack is sour,
The better for the embittered hour;
It should do good to heart and head
When your soul is in my soul's stead;
And I will friend you, if I may,
In the dark and cloudy day.

There was a king reigned in the East:
There, when kings will sit to feast,
They get their fill before they think
With poisoned meat and poisoned drink.
He gathered all that springs to birth
From the many-venomed earth;
First a little, thence to more,
He sampled all her killing store;
And easy, smiling, seasoned sound,
Sate the king when healths went round.
They put arsenic in his meat
And stared aghast to watch him eat;
They poured strychnine in his cup
And shook to see him drink it up:
They shook, they stared as white's their shirt:
Them it was their poison hurt.
--I tell the tale that I heard told.
Mithridates, he died old.

Movie Log: What's Up, Tiger Lilly?

I'm posting about this almost entirely out of a mania of completism (the "almost" is because I also have a mania about posting regularly); I saw What's Up, Tiger Lilly? again last week, about twenty years after I saw it the first time.

And -- you know what? -- I didn't find it as funny as I did when I was in high school. I also now have serious doubts that the Japanese spy movie that Woody Allen dubbed over to make this film wasn't planned as a comedy to begin with -- some of the actors are clearly mugging.

But it's such a puffball of a movie that it's not worth seriously talking about -- it is what it is, and it's very much a '60s artifact, and I found it still mildly enjoyable.

Just in Case Anyone Thinks I'm Purely Virtual...

I was recently spotted in the wild.

Hugo Awards Meme

Picked up from The Slush God:

If you nominated for the Hugos this year, copy this list and bold the selections that you actually nominated. Underline selections that you've read/seen (or tried to read/view and gave up on, etc.) but didn't nominate. If you've passionately dislike one of the selections, italicize it (in addition to underlining it). If you like, add a pick of your own to each category that you feel should have made it, by placing it in [brackets] at the end of each category list.

Novel:

• Eifelheim by Michael Flynn
• His Majesty's Dragon by Naomi Novik
• Glasshouse by Charles Stross
• Rainbows End by Vernor Vinge
• Blindsight by Peter Watts
• [Farthing by Jo Walton]

Novella:

• "The Walls of the Universe" by Paul Melko
• "A Billion Eves" by Robert Reed
• "Inclination" by William Shunn
• "Lord Weary's Empire" by Michael Swanwick
• "Julian: A Christmas Story" by Robert Charles Wilson
• ["Missile Gap" by Charles Stross]
  

Novelette:

• "Yellow Card Man" by Paolo Bacigalupi
• "Dawn, and Sunset, and the Colours of the Earth" by Michael F. Flynn
• "The Djinn's Wife" by Ian McDonald
• "All the Things You Are" by Mike Resnick
• "Pol Pot's Beautiful Daughter" by Geoff Ryman
• ["Incarnation Day" by Walter Jon Williams]

Short Story:

• "How to Talk to Girls at Parties" by Neil Gaiman
• "Kin" by Bruce McAllister
• "Impossible Dreams" by Timothy Pratt
• "Eight Episodes" by Robert Reed
• "The House Beyond Your Sky" by Benjamin Rosenbaum
• ["Expedition, With Recipes" by Joe Haldeman]
  

Related Book:

• About Writing: Seven Essays, Four Letters, and Five Interviews by Samuel R. Delany
• Heinlein's Children: The Juveniles by Joseph T. Major
• James Tiptree, Jr. : The Double Life of Alice B. Sheldon by Julie Phillips
• Cover Story: The Art of John Picacio by John Picacio
• Worldcon Guest of Honor Speeches edited by Mike Resnick and Joe Siclari
• [Kiddology by Tom Kidd]
  

Dramatic Presentation, Long Form:

• Children of Men
• Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
• The Prestige (after the deadline)
  
• A Scanner Darkly
• V for Vendetta
• [Stranger Than Fiction -- which I also I saw after the deadline]

Dramatic Presentation, Short Form:

• Battlestar Galactica, "Downloaded"
• Doctor Who, "Army of Ghosts" and "Doomsday"
• Doctor Who, "Girl in the Fireplace"
• Doctor Who, "School Reunion"
• Stargate SG-1, "200"
• [no pick]
  

Editor, Long Form:

• Lou Anders
  
• James Patrick Baen
• Ginjer Buchanan
• David G. Hartwell
• Patrick Nielsen Hayden
• [James Minz]
  

Editor, Short Form:

• Gardner Dozois
• David G. Hartwell
• Stanley Schmidt
• Gordon Van Gelder
• Sheila Williams
• [Marvin Kaye -- if I had a sixth vote]

Professional Artist:

• Bob Eggleton
• Donato Giancola
• Stephan Martiniere
• John Jude Palencar
• John Picacio
• [Julie Bell]

Semiprozine:

• Ansible
• Interzone
• Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet
• Locus
• The New York Review of Science Fiction
• [no pick]
  

Fanzine:

• Banana Wings
• Challenger
• The Drink Tank
• Plokta
• Science-Fiction Five-Yearly
• [no pick]
  

Fan Writer:

• Chris Garcia
• John Hertz
• Dave Langford
• John Scalzi
• Steven H. Silver
• [James Nicoll]
  

Fan Artist:

• Brad W. Foster
• Teddy Harvia
• Sue Mason
• Steve Stiles
• Frank Wu
• [no pick]
  

John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer:

• Scott Lynch
• Sarah Monette
• Naomi Novik
• Brandon Sanderson
• Lawrence M. Schoen
• [Justine Larbalestier]

I didn't put anything in italics for various reasons...which I don't think need to be explained.

Read in March

Instead of doing an "Also Read in March" post, I've decided to do one listing everything, with links to the ones I've talked about already and a line or two about the books that didn't get their own posts. This appeals to my excessively tidy mind, so I expect it's what I'll do in future as well.

• Darby Conley, Get Fuzzy: Scrum Bums (3/1)
  The latest collection of the strip cartoon. Conley constructs some absolutely appalling puns -- and I do mean "constructs," he makes them into little shaggy-dog stories like Fredric Brown or Asimov -- which still manage to make me laugh. I also enjoy his character-based comedy. And I really like having books of strip cartoons around to dip into.
• John Scalzi, The Android's Dream (3/2)
• Ivan Brunetti, editor, An Anthology of Graphic Fiction, Cartoons, & True Stories (3/3)
  See my epic post comparing this to the 2006 edition of The Best American Comics, if I ever manage to finish it.
• Gardner Dozois, editor, The Year's Best Science Fiction, Twenty-Fourth Annual Collection (3/4)
  It's the big annual, and I read it after Hartwell's somewhat smaller annual and Strahan's all-novellas annual (also smaller, but not by as much), so all of the 2006 stories are smearing together in my head into one uber-anthology. As I recall, Dozois's book has a few things that annoyed me (which I won't mention in public) and some stories I loved (Reynolds's "Signal to Noise" and "Nightingale," Williams's "Incarnation Day"), which is par for the course for a book like this. I still think any one serious about SF should read this every year, even if you don't read any other short fiction.
• various writers and artists, Hellboy: The Black Wedding (3/5)
  I haven't seen the animated version of Hellboy -- hell, I still haven't seen the movie -- and this underwhelmed me. It's OK, but it's like a fourth-generation Xerox; I don't expect I'll be back for the next one.
• Richard Sala, The Grave Robber's Daughter (3/6)
  Another creepy story from Sala, this time about a town taken over by teenagers and killer clowns.
• Mike Richardson & Rick Geary, Cravan (3/7)
  The life story of someone who disappeared; Cravan is an interesting early 20th century art-world figure, and he may have become the reclusive writer B. Traven. (Richardson mentions the possibility, but says that there's no way to prove or disprove it at this point.) I love Geary's art, and this is much like Geary's solo work, being concerned with odd historical minutiae (though not a murder case, as is usual for Geary solo). I have no idea what the audience was expected to be for this book; I suspect it got published because Richardson owns Dark Horse, but passion is no bad thing in publishing.
  
• Richard K. Morgan, Thirteen (3/8)
  Just published in the UK as Black Man, and not published here yet.
  
• Charles Burns, Big Baby (3/9)
  Continuing the unified complete Burns reprinting project at Fantagraphics; I had these stories all somewhere or another (mostly in comics-size form), but it's good to have them between two covers and on a shelf. I also like the Big Baby stories better than El Borbah; the kid is a more interesting character, and allows for more subtlety in storytelling.
  
• Karen Traviss, Star Wars: Legacy of the Force: Sacrifice (3/11)
  I've taken a vow not to talk about Star Wars books in public for about six months. Mouth zipped.
• Kage Baker, The Machine's Child (3/12)
  A perfectly enjoyable entry in the "Company" series, which I've been enjoying (and trying to get SFBC members to read, with little luck) for nearly a decade now. (But see below.)
  
• Brian Michael Bendis, Fortune and Glory (3/14)
  Boy writer goes to Hollywood and does not get a movie made. It's the same old story, but Bendis knows that, which makes it OK. I can see why he doesn't draw anymore, though; the rubber-hose arms are a bit distracting, and his art chops aren't up the level of his writing in general.
  
• Kage Baker, The Sons of Heaven (3/15)
  The big ending of the Company series. Boy howdy, does this one move. In retrospect, a lot of the middle books in this series dithered around -- or, at least, it now looks like dithering once you see what Baker can do when she slams her plot accelerator into the firewall. It's not published yet, so no details -- but, damn, this is a hell of a lot of fun. I think even people who haven't read the series up to now could jump on here and enjoy the ride.
  
• Robert Sullivan, How Not to Get Rich (3/19)
• Donald E. Westlake, Adios, Scheherazade (3/20)
• Victoria Geng, Love Trouble Is My Business (3/21)
• Mark L. Van Name, One Jump Ahead (3/25)
  A first novel of SFnal adventure about what I keep thinking of as a boy and his tank, though he's about a hundred and fifty years old (with a lot of living packed into those years, only bits of which do we learn about) and it's a space-capable assault vehicle. The book is slightly to this side of what I'd call military SF -- a territory I'd like to see more books occupy -- and it was very enjoyable.
  
• John Sladek, The Lunatics of Terra (3/27)
• G.B. Trudeau, Heckuva Job, Bushie! (3/28)
  The latest Doonesbury collection; I have a nearly-complete collection (I think I'm just missing the rare book about the TV special), and I've been reading it since about 1982. Trudeau isn't always on (he's had whole years that don't go much of anywhere), but he's been quite good lately, and he's one of the very best political cartoonists of our era. (You can tell that in large part by seeing how many politicians absolutely loathe him.)
  
• Samuel Holt, I Know a Trick Worth Two of That (3/29)
  Second in the pseudonymous mystery series by Donald E. Westlake from the mid-'80s; Holt is the out-of-work actor first-person sleuth of the series. This is slightly cozy for my taste, and isn't Westlake in either funny or serious mode (but instead splitting the difference with a light adventure tone, which I think is a bit wishy-washy for him). Not his best stuff, but worth reading for completest like me.
  
• Terry Pratchett with Stephen Briggs and illustrated by Paul Kidby, Ankh-Morport Post Office Handbook: Discworld Diary 2007 (3/30)
  Some of the Discworld diaries have more text than others; last year's Discworld Almanak was loaded with odd bits and articles, while this one (perhaps a product of exhaustion after last year?) is just a yearly desk diary with cute fake facts on each week's page and a short section up front with the history and legends of the post office. I suppose there may still be people who use a desk diary, and this could be useful to them, but the main audience is, of course, Discworld fans. And those will be slightly disappointed with the slimness of this year's entry, I guess, though the little here is funnier than the lot in the Almanack was.
  

And that was what I read in March, minus a couple of things for work that I didn't finish (mostly on purpose -- I read pieces of books for the SFBC quite regularly, but don't like to publicly have opinions about things I haven't read all of...or admit what those books were, for that matter).