[ 
Mood: Happy ]
[ Currently: Drinking a nice blend of OJ and Grapefruit Juice ]
Minon by L.A. Banks was my latest reading to tackle.
And it became one on a short list of books that I abandoned.
Minon tells the tale of Damali Richards is a spoken word poet who is also a vampire slayer. She is surrounded by her musicians, who also happen to be her back-up fighters and trainers.
Clearly a Hip Hop Buffy, I found it poorly written and a chore to get through. I gave up.
Meh.
[ 
Mood: Sleepy ]
[ Currently: Getting ready for bed. ]
This book, while not genre, was amazing.
In order to pass his civics class, Ian has to do forty volunteer hours. He signs up to help at a soup kitchen where he meets Sarge, a former Canadian soldiers who is now homeless.
Through Sarge, Ian learns about the Rwandan genocide and even more about the world in general. He finds a purpose beyond his shallow, self-centered existance.
This is not a preachy book, but it had me in tears. It also made me grateful for the life I have. I plan to buy this book and use it in my classroom.
[ Mood: Happy ]
There have been rumors for decades of the existence of a “lost” Lee-Kirby Fantastic Four. Apparently Kirby had finished the pencils for #103, 102 being his last issue. Marvel is finally publishing the lost issue in February.
Click on image to enlarge
| Quote: |
| FANTASTIC FOUR: THE LOST ADVENTURE Written by STAN LEE Pencils & Cover by JACK KIRBY IT’S THE COMIC BOOK EQUIVALENT OF A LOST BEATLES TRACK! Together, Stan Lee and Jack Kirby produced 102 consecutive issues of FANTASTIC FOUR. But there was a 103rd story they’d begun in 1970, but never finished-until now! Working from copies of Jack’s penciled pages, Stan Lee and Joe Sinnott have reunited, to complete the work they started almost four decades ago! Plus, this super-sized issue includes reproductions of Kirby’s unlinked penciled pages, with border notes and analysis by John Morrow, and a complete reprint of FANTASTIC FOUR #108 by Stan Lee and John Buscema, which incorporated some of the material from the lost story as a flashback 64 PGS./Rated A …$4.99 |
The biggest shocker to me is the price. Marvel could have easily raked us over the coals on this one, but for once common sense won over greed. I’ll gladly fork over my $4.99.
Click on image to enlarge
Newsarama had a very informative interview back in August with Marvel editor Tom Brevoort about the genesis of this project.
| Quote: |
| [T]he relationship between Stan and Jack had deteriorated pretty badly by the point this issue was being done. Apparently, Kirby was insisting that Stan provide him with an actual written plot if he was going to be listed as the writer. And apparently, that’s what was done with this story-though the actual plot document by Stan has never turned up. Supposedly, when the boards came in, Stan felt that Jack had gone off the rails a little bit with the story-he wasn’t satisfied with it-and he put it aside to try to deal with at a later date. |
And I was very pleased to learn this from the interview:
| Quote: |
| [W]e’re paying Lisa [Kirby] and the Kirby Estate for this job as though Jack penciled it today, at a rate commensurate with what a penciler of his caliber would receive in 2006. It’s certainly a greater amount of money than Jack was ever paid for any single issue in his career at Marvel. And like any other new book, if the Special sells well enough, the Kirby Estate will receive incentives based on the total sales. |
Click on images to enlarge
FANTASTIC FOUR: THE LOST ADVENTURE was originally published on The Geek Curmudgeon
[ 
Mood: Cool ]
[ 
Currently: Watching Coronation Street ]
Kim Harrison has been writing the Rachel Morgan supernatural mysteries for quite some time now. Her fifth book in the series, For a Few Demons More is the latest to be read by me. And I have to say, wow!
Harrison has done an amazing job of world building. Her Cincinnati is a ghost of city, with a quarter of the world’s population killed by a mutated virus that came from genetically modified tomatoes. With the outbreak of the plague, the Interlanders (witches, vampires, werewolves and pixies) revealed themselves to the humans.
This book countinues that world building. There’s a serial killer stalking the Hollows. Their target? Humans who are mysteriously turned into werewolves. Rachel, a witch and sort of private eye, wakes up to find a demon has desanctified the church she lives in and is looking for something. So Rachel sets about to solve the serial killer case and get her church resanctified so that every bad guy isn’t tromping through her house. It is a rapid and fun filled ride.
Harrison, unlike some other Vampire Mystery writers, has no qualms moving plots along and killing off major characters. Sex does occur in the books, but it is not the main reason for writing them.
Good read. Go get this.
Scott Dunbier, former Wildstorm editor, recounts on his blog one of my favorite Michael Moorcock stories. In the mid-50s, Mike worked for Tarzan Adventures, who had acquired the plates of the Burne Hogarth-illustrated Tarzan stories. Problem was that the plates were in Spanish.
| Quote: |
| “Oh, I speak Spanish,” I told him, “It would be nothing for me to take those plates and translate them into English.” He was surprised, but agreed, and the plates were duly delivered.
I didn’t speak a single word of Spanish and would have been hard put in those days to tell you what ‘Hola!’ meant. So all I had to work with were the strips themselves and make a guess at what the Spanish meant. I also had to work very quickly, since we were on a weekly schedule. For the fun of it, I also decided to use the names of friends in the science fiction community, which is how you can easily tell which strips are by me and which by the original writer–my story lines, of course, are also subtly different, but they also carry characters like the evil Benford twins (Greg and Jim Benford were then teenagers living with their military dad in Germany), Ken Bulmer, Lars Helander, Ron Bennett and various other well-known UK SF writers and fanzine fans of the day. |
I’ve heard Mike relate this story many times and I’m glad to see it in print. The only piece missing from Dunbier’s report is that Moorcock was actually 15 at the time!
Original text (Click on image to enlarge)
Text re-written by Michael Moorcock (Click on image to enlarge)
Moorcock on Tarzan was originally published on The Geek Curmudgeon
In order to present a more balanced assessment of the recently released Ratatouille DVD, panned by our very own Alan J. Porter, I present an excerpt from my SF Site review.
| Quote: |
| Not only does Ratatouille include the animated short “Lifted,” which originally appeared with the movie’s theatrical release, but also features the highly entertaining original short “Your Friend the Rat.” Rendered in a combination of traditional and computer-generated animation styles, Remy (Patton Oswalt) and his brother Emile (Peter Sohn) recount the history and occasionally positive aspects of rat-human relations. Did you know that the black rat (rattus rattus) first arrived in the West after hitching a ride with the Crusaders? Or that rats weren’t the cause of the plague but rather it started with fleas? Remy and Emile present these fascinating facts and a lot more in a friendly, non-icky way, successfully showcasing the more appealing aspects of the vermin. |
Course, unlike Alan, I liked the movie, as expressed in my RevSF review earlier this year.
Since Alan and I are obviously at odds, I suggest you watch the DVD, and make up your own mind. We’ll both be curious to hear what you think.
The Ratatouille DVD: My Take was originally published on The Geek Curmudgeon
[ 
Mood: Angry ]
"Perhaps no place in any community is so totally democratic as the town library. The only entrance requirement is interest."
– Lady Bird Johnson
So budget time has rolled around in my city. A new mayor was elected last year on a promise of a 0% tax increase, and the citizens fell for it.
After Mike Harris and Stephen Harper, you think they’d know what that really meant.
So to keep his promise, the proposal has the city shutting ten library branches. That’s right, ten. 1 followed by a 0.
One of these branches is my local branch. It sits in a typical inner city Ottawa neighbourhood. To afford to own a house in this area, you have to be firmly in the middle class. Mixed in with these lovely single family dwellings and condos are lots and lots of rental property. Those are the people I am worried about. Many of them are my students.
Within easy walking distance of this branch are two schools with huge lower income and welfare class populations. Many of them are recent immigrants. They don’t have the money for extras like books. The library is for them a lifeline. Every time I am in there, I see a student reading, working on homework or using a computer. They walk over after school on a regular basis.
Will it affect me? Yes, but I am middle class. I have a car and can drive to another branch. Many of my students, however, are not. Their parents are not going drive them to the next branch. And our bus system is set up to take people in and out of the downtown, not across town.
And that doesn’t take into account the fact that another proposal of the budget is to raise the transit fares.
One of the interesting things about our mayor is that he is a millionaire business man. Another millionaire business man, Andrew Carnegie, spent the latter part of his life building libraries. It seems our mayor is going to spend his golden years closing them down.
Somewhere, angels are weeping.
"The only true equalisers in the world are books; the only treasure-house open to all comers is a library; the only wealth which will not decay is knowledge; the only jewel which you can carry beyond the grave is wisdom."
– J. A. Langford
As many of you no doubt know, the long-awaited League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier was released today. I received a review copy and have read roughly two-thirds of what is easily the densest and most complex League tale yet attempted.
Written and drawn in a variety of styles, the Black Dossier is essentially the hidden history of the League and hence the world. In the first 2/3, I discovered the origins of James Bond’s boss “M”, “Q”, Orlando, the very first League, the 1910 German (lead by Dr. Mabuse!) and the 1911 French incarnations of the league. I learned how Mina Murray first met Nemo (remember they are both part of the team in the first issue.) Also, there is an excellent piece on occult history by Oliver Haddo that ties Melniboné, Hyperborea, and the Great Old Ones into our reality. Allusions to 1984 abound. How exactly do Gloriana, Fanny Hill, Harry Lime, and Shakespeare tie into the tale is quite amazing… and let us not forget Wilhelmina Murray and Allan Quartermain. I’m not even done with the book yet.
Thankfully in an attempt to make sense of it all, Jess Nevins has already started his annotations. The accompanying book will be published next Summer from Monkeybrain.
Not that the tome was published without some controversy. Comicscape discusses the controversy, Black Dossier, and the League in general in this fascinating interview.
Though plans are afoot for an Absolute edition, rumor has it that there will be NO paperback version. Since this hardback includes various paper stocks, a Tijuana bible insert, and a 3-d story (including glasses), a paperback would probably be in the $25 range. Given the excellent quality of the art and story combined with the fact that The League of Extraordinary Gentleman stories need to be re-read, at $30 this book is a steal. It will be the best $30 you’ve spent on a book in a long time.
Expect a more formal type of review soon…
Black Dossier was originally published on The Geek Curmudgeon
| Quote: |
| Crater From 1908 Russian Space Impact Found, Team Says
Maria Cristina Valsecchi in Rome, Italy Almost a century after a mysterious explosion in Russia flattened a huge swath of Siberian forest, scientists have found what they believe is a crater made by the cosmic object that made the blast. |
The Tunguska Event or Explosion fascinated me as a child. Glad to see some more information. Though it won’t stop the UFOlogists from spouting conspiracy nonsense regarding the incident, especially with bits like this in the article: “The basin of Lake Cheko is not circular, deep, and steep like a typical impact crater” and “lacks the rim of debris usually found around typical impact craters” and “the cosmic body, he added, which likely made a "soft crash” in the marshy terrain.“
Image from Kulik’s 1927 expedition of the explosion aftermath
The Tunguska Event Crater was originally published on The Geek Curmudgeon
[ Mood: Angry ]
[ Currently: Cause my husband has the day off in lieu of Rememberance Day ]
Lest you think this blog will devolve into a long litany of geek related pregnancy anecdotes, I bring to you a series of quick reviews!
Hot Fuzz
Finally saw this movie on the weekend and wow! Kick ass! The homage to the buddy cop genre with copious amounts of blood thrown in was wonderful. We also watched the US tour footage where the men stripped to their underwear during phone interviews. And cake flushing? Gross but hilarious!
Ruby in the Smoke
One of Philip Pullman’s early works, this Victorian thriller follows Sally Lockheart as she tries to unravel the mystery behind her father’s death. A fun read that lets you see Pullman’s writing style develop.
Trixie Belden and the Mystery of the Blinking Eye
I love Trixie Belden. When I was 8 or 9, my stepmother introduced me to this series. For years, I have hunted second hand bookstores and garage sales looking for the books I was missing in my collection. Imagine my joy when they started republishing the stories. This one follows Trixie and the gang to New York where Trixie buys a statue in an antique store. Immediately she is followed and harassed by two scary men. Full of twists and turns, and incredibly dated language, this was a fun book.
More later.