My review of The Eagle makes me three-for-three in the negative department this year. Over at Moving Pictures, I wrote:

How I long for a decent film…

For Omnivoracious (Amazon’s book blog), I interviewed first time novelist Stina Leicht about her book Of Blood and Honey.

This is but a small snippet of the lengthy interview. Stina and I also discuss the Fey, researching prisons, the art of violence, and why women find it easy to write male characters.

Let’s take a quick look to see what’s arrived at the Geek Compound.

Other Kingdoms
by Richard Matheson

Promo copy:

For over half a century, Richard Matheson has enthralled and terrified readers with such timeless classics as I Am Legend, The Incredible Shrinking Man, Duel, Somewhere in Time, and What Dreams May Come. Now the Grand Master returns with a bewitching tale of erotic suspense and enchantment.…

1918. A young American soldier, recently wounded in the Great War, Alex White comes to Gatford to escape his troubled past. The pastoral English village seems the perfect spot to heal his wounded body and soul. True, the neighboring woods are said to be haunted by capricious, even malevolent spirits, but surely those are just old wives’ tales.

Aren’t they?

A frightening encounter in the forest leads Alex into the arms of Magda Variel, an alluring red-haired widow rumored to be a witch. She warns him to steer clear of the wood and the perilous faerie kingdom it borders, but Alex cannot help himself. Drawn to its verdant mysteries, he finds love, danger…and wonders that will forever change his view of the world.

Other Kingdoms casts a magical spell, as conjured by a truly legendary storyteller.

Matheson has crafted some of all time favorite books and short stories. A new novel from him is always a thrill.

Shadowfever
by Karen Marie Moning

Promo copy:

“Evil is a completely different creature, Mac. Evil is bad that believes it’s good.”

MacKayla Lane was just a child when she and her sister, Alina, were given up for adoption and banished from Ireland forever.

Twenty years later, Alina is dead and Mac has returned to the country that expelled them to hunt her sister’s murderer. But after discovering that she descends from a bloodline both gifted and cursed, Mac is plunged into a secret history: an ancient conflict between humans and immortals who have lived concealed among us for thousands of years.

What follows is a shocking chain of events with devastating consequences, and now Mac struggles to cope with grief while continuing her mission to acquire and control the Sinsar Dubh—a book of dark, forbidden magic scribed by the mythical Unseelie King, containing the power to create and destroy worlds.

In an epic battle between humans and Fae, the hunter becomes the hunted when the Sinsar Dubh turns on Mac and begins mowing a deadly path through those she loves.
Who can she turn to? Who can she trust? Who is the woman haunting her dreams? More important, who is Mac herself and what is the destiny she glimpses in the black and crimson designs of an ancient tarot card?

From the luxury of the Lord Master’s penthouse to the sordid depths of an Unseelie nightclub, from the erotic bed of her lover to the terrifying bed of the Unseelie King, Mac’s journey will force her to face the truth of her exile, and to make a choice that will either save the world . . . or destroy it.

Beautifully designed book.

The Alchemist in the Shadows
by Pierre Pevel
Translation by Tom Clegg
Cover by Jon Sullivan

Promo copy:

Welcome to Paris, in 1633, where dragons menace the realm. Cardinal Richelieu, the most powerful and most feared man in France, is on his guard. He knows France is under threat, and that a secret society known as the Black Claw is conspiring against him from the heart of the greatest courts in Europe. They will strike from the shadows, and when they do the blow will be both terrible and deadly. To counter the threat, Richelieu has put his most trusted men into play: the Cardinal’s Blades, led by Captain la Fargue. Six men and a woman, all of exceptional abilities and all ready to risk their lives on his command. They have saved France before, and the Cardinal is relying on them to do it again. So when la Fargue hears from a beautiful, infamous, deadly Italian spy claiming to have valuable information, he has to listen …and when La Donna demands Cardinal Richelieu’s protection before she will talk, la Fargue is even prepared to consider it. Because La Donna can name their enemy. It’s a man as elusive as he is manipulative, as subtle as Richelieu himself, an exceptionally dangerous adversary: the Alchemist in the shadows …

The Super Hero Squad Show: Quest For The Infinity Sword Volume Three

Promo copy:

Can the world’s greatest superheroes keep Super Hero City safe by preventing Dr. Doom and his hysterically evil minions from collecting all the fragments of the legendary Infinity Sword? Find out as Iron Man, Wolverine, the Hulk, the Silver Surfer, Thor, the Falcon and their friends return to face Super Hero City’s zaniest villains in Quest For The Infinity Sword’s third fun-filled volume!

Features the guest voices of Taye Diggs (Daybreak), Michelle Trachtenberg (Buffy The Vampire Slayer), Adrian Pasdar (Heroes), LeVar Burton (Star Trek: The Next Generation), Kevin Sorbo (The Legendary Adventures Of Hercules) and Shawn Ashmore (X-Men).

More in Part II

Let’s take a quick look to see what’s arrived at the Geek Compound.

Santa Sangre
Directed by Alejandro Jodorowsky

Promo copy:

In the 1970s, his legendary films El Topo and The Holy Mountain redefined movies as both art and entertainment while changing the face of cinema forever. And in 1989, visionary writer/director Alejandro Jodorowsky returned with his modern masterpiece: It is the story of a young circus performer, the crime of passion that shatters his soul, and the macabre journey back to the world of his armless mother, deaf-mute lover, and murder. It is an odyssey of ecstasy and anguish, belief and blasphemy, beauty and madness. It is unlike any movie you have ever seen before…or ever will. Axel Jodorowsky, Blanca Guerra and Guy Stockwell star in this epic of surreal genius, now fully restored and featuring more than five hours of exclusive Extras that reveal the mind behind one of the most provocative and unforgettable motion picture experiences of our time. On DVD for the first time ever in America.

WOW!

Demonstorm (Legends of the Raven 3)
by James Barclay
Cover by Raymond Swanland

Promo copy:

THIS IS THE END …The dragons have gone home, the elves are safe. The Raven have kept their promises. But fate has not finished with them. As the war between the colleges rages on an old enemy senses that his chance to revenge a bitter defeat has come. Tessaya, Lord of the Paleon Tribes has waited patiently for his moment and now, with Balaia in flames, he makes his move and unleashes the Wesmen hordes. In Xetesk, his forces scattered, Dystran, Lord of the Mount faces certain defeat by the Wesmen unless he unleashes the horrfying power of dimensional magics. And Dystran has not come this far to be beaten at the last by a rabble of ignorant tribesmen. And so the veil between dimensions is torn …And beyond, a predatory evil stirs. Demons catch the scent of countless souls in Balaia. Can even the Raven prevail when the world is coming to an end? A fantasy milestone is reached. James Barclay brings his sensational saga of The Raven to a heartsopping conclusion.

Driver for the Dead #3
Created and Written by: John Heffernan
Pencils and Inks by: Leonardo Manco
Paints by: Kinsun Loh and Jerry Choo

Promo copy:

Alabaster Graves is the Driver for the Dead. He and his hearse, Black Betty, handle the more “lively” cases in New Orleans: vampires, angry ghosts, the not-quite-dead. Earlier tonight he was sent to retrieve the body of one of the town’s most famous and beloved spirit healers, Mose Freeman, with Mose’s granddaughter Marissa along for the ride.

Unbeknownst to Graves, he was not the only one after Mose’s body. A necromancer, named Fallow, along with his gang of undead toughs, was also in town murdering other supernatural practitioners and stealing their powers by attaching powerful pieces of their corpses to his own piecemeal, undead personage.

Now, Fallow has injured Graves, stolen Mose’s body and kidnapped Marissa. Graves, rescued by a group of woodsmen and their mysterious leader, has discovered three things: who Marissa is, why she’s so important to Fallow… and the only possible way to save her: He must hunt down the fabled Loup Garoux, an ancient and deadly werewolf created by Marissa’s own grandmother, kill the creature, and steal the voodoo-cursed knitting needle from its chest. And that’s the easy part…

Welcome to the Greenhouse
Edited and with an introduction by Gordon Van Gelder
Preface by Elizabeth Kolbert
Cover by Eric Drooker

Promo copy:

The shotgun man barked, “That will not save us. Not save the Arctic. Our beautiful home.” He had a knotted face and burning eyes beneath heavy brows.
She talked fast, hands up, open palms toward him. “All that SkyShield nonsense won’t stop the oceans from turning acid. Only fossil—”
“Do what you can, when you can. We learn that up here.”
—from Welcome to the Greenhouse

Forty years ago, Walt Kelly’s comic strip character Pogo famously intoned: “We have met the enemy, and he is us.” Now, as the evidence for climate change becomes overwhelming, we learn the hard reality behind that witticism. The possible destruction, and certain transformation, of the ecosphere has been brought about by our own activities.

What will our new world look like? How will we—can we—adapt? The clash of a rapidly changing environment with earth’s self-styled ruling species, humans, provides ample creative fodder for this riveting anthology of original science fiction. In Welcome to the Greenhouse, award-winning editor Gordon Van Gelder has brought together sixteen speculative stories by some of the most imaginative writers of our time. Terrorists, godlike terraformers, and humans both manipulative and hapless populate these pages. The variety of stories reflects the possibilities of our future: grim, hopeful, fantastic and absurd.

Included is new work by Brian W. Aldiss, Jeff Carlson, Judith Moffett, Matthew Hughes, Gregory Benford, Michael Alexander, Bruce Sterling, Joseph Green, Pat MacEwen, Alan Dean Foster, David Prill, George Guthridge, Paul Di Filippo, Chris Lawson, Ray Vukcevich and M. J. Locke.

Part I

Let’s take a quick look to see what’s arrived at the Geek Compound.

Enigmatic Pilot: A Tall Tale Too True
by Kris Sanussemm

Promo copy:

Enigmatic Pilot is Kris Saknussemm’s outrageously brilliant yet profoundly moving exploration and excavation of the American dream—and nightmare.

In 1844, in a still-young America, the first intimations of civil war are stirring throughout the land. In Zanesville, Ohio, the Sitturd family—Hephaestus, a clubfooted inventor; his wife, Rapture, a Creole from the Sea Islands; and their prodigiously gifted six-year-old son, Lloyd, whose libido is as precocious as his intellect—are forced to flee the only home they have ever known for an uncertain future in Texas, whence Hephaestus’s half-brother, Micah, has sent them a mysterious invitation, promising riches and wonders too amazing to be entrusted to paper.

Thus begins one of the most incredible American journeys since Huck Finn and Jim first pushed their raft into the Mississippi. Along the way, Lloyd will learn the intricacies of poker and murder, solve the problem of manned flight, find—and lose—true love, and become swept up in an ancient struggle between two secret societies whose arcane dispute has shaped the world’s past and threatens to reshape its future. Each side wants to use Lloyd against the other, but Lloyd has his own ideas—and access to an occult technology as powerful as his imagination.

I lavished praise upon Saknussemm’s first novel Zanesville, so I’m looking forward to the second volume in his Lodemania Testament.

Star Wars: The Old Republic: Deceived
by Paul S. Kemp

Promo copy:

The second novel set in the Old Republic era and based on the massively multiplayer online game Star Wars®: The Old Republic™ ramps up the action and brings readers face-to-face for the first time with a Sith warrior to rival the most sinister of the Order’s Dark Lords—Darth Malgus, the mysterious, masked Sith of the wildly popular “Deceived” and “Hope” game trailers.

Malgus brought down the Jedi Temple on Coruscant in a brutal assault that shocked the galaxy. But if war crowned him the darkest of Sith heroes, peace would transform him into something far more heinous—something Malgus would never want to be, but cannot stop, any more than he can stop the rogue Jedi fast approaching.

Her name is Aryn Leneer—and the lone Knight that Malgus cut down in the fierce battle for the Jedi Temple was her Master. And now she’s going to find out what happened to him, even if it means breaking every rule in the book.

Hidden Cities
by Daniel Fox

Promo copy:

The mythic beasts and glorious legends of feudal China illuminate a world at war in this, the conclusion to Daniel Fox’s critically acclaimed series.

Whatever they thought, this was always where they were going: to the belly of the dragon, or the belly of the sea.

More by chance than good judgment, the young emperor has won his first battle. The rebels have retreated from the coastal city of Santung—but they’ll be back. Distracted by his pregnant concubine, the emperor sends a distrusted aide, Ping Wen, to govern Santung in his place. There, the treacherous general will discover the healer Tien, who is obsessed with a library of sacred mage texts and the secrets concealed within—secrets upon which, Ping Wen quickly realizes, the fate of the whole war may turn.

As all sides of this seething conflict prepare for more butchery, a miner of magical jade, himself invulnerable, desperately tries to save his beautiful and yet brutally scarred clan cousin; a priestess loses her children, who are taken as pawns in a contest beyond her comprehension; and a fierce and powerful woman commits an act of violence that will entwine her, body and soul, with the spirit of jade itself. Amid a horde of soldiers, torturers, and runaways, these people will test both their human and mystical powers against a violent world. But one force trumps all: the huge, hungry, wrathful dragon.

For my latest Nexus Graphica column, I explore my new found interested in the works of Jacques Tardi.

I discuss the reasons why the new Fantagraphics edition worked for me and how Tardi "managed to worm his way into my consciousness."

Check it all out at SF Site.

(The title of the piece comes from a Kim Thompson quote about Tardi. "I’d almost have to go outside the world of comics and say he’s maybe like the Martin Scorsese of European comics. ")

Considering the short month, lots of goodies coming from Netflix. Four classic Universal monster flicks, the only Michael Moorcock story ever filmed, several geek-oriented TV series, Hellboy, Benny Hill, and an excellent remake of a beloved 80s hit all make their premiere this month.

* denotes streaming for the first time via Netflix.

Premiering February 1:

*3rd Rock from the Sun: Seasons 1-5
The Amityville Horror (1979)
Amityville 3-D
Amityville II: The Possession
*And Soon the Darkness(1970)
The Avengers (1998)
Bedazzled (1967)
*The Best of Benny Hill
*Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb
*The Bride of Frankenstein
*Circus of Horrors
*Demons of the Mind
*Dreamcatcher (2003)
Enter the Dragon
*Fear in the Night (1972)
*The Final Programme (The Last Days of Man on Earth)
A Fish Called Wanda
The Good Son (1993)
*Martial Arts Master: The Life of Bruce Lee
*The Martian Chronicles
*Miracle on 34th Street (1994)
Night Watch (2005)
The Thaw
*The Towering Inferno
*The Wolf Man (1941)
*Wendy Wu: Homecoming Warrior
Xanadu

Premiering February 4:

Apollo 13
Breakfast of Aliens
The Golden Blaze

Premiering February 7:

*Superman/Shazam!: The Return of Black Adam

Premiering February 8:

*American Experience: Dinosaur Wars

Premiering February 11:

Amazon Warrior
The Champagne Club
Devil’s Gate (2003)
Freaky Circus Guy
*Ghost of Frankenstein
Gulliver’s Travel (2006)
The Initiate (2001)
*Jason X
Julie & Jack
Marker (2005)
Point of Contact
Popcorn (1991)
The Ritual (2000)
Shredder (2003)
*Son of Frankenstein (1939)
The Thing (1982)
The Valley of Tears (2006)

Premiering February 12:

*24: Season 8

Premiering February 15:

*The Chinese Connection (Fist of Fury)
*Indie Sex
*Kyle XY: Seasons 1-2
*Legend of the Seeker: Season 1
*Men Behaving Badly: Series 1
A Monkey’s Tale
*Reaper: Seasons 1-2

Premiering February 17:

*The Karate Kid (2010)
*Me and Orson Welles

Premiering February 19:

*The Spy Next Door

Premiering February 23:

Happy Gilmore

Premiering February 25:

*Daybreakers

Premiering February 26:

*Hellboy

Info courtesy of FeedFliks.

Over at Moving Pictures, I reviewed the Simon West/Jason Statham remake of the classic Charles Bronson thriller The Mechanic.

My morning started with a rumor that the extraordinary Dark Horse edition of Blacksad was out of print.

After being convinced by me that she *needed* the Díaz Canales/Juanjo Guarnido masterpiece, my friend went to a local shop, only to be told that the book was out of print and Dark Horse had no plans to reprint the edition.

It was only last month that I anointed Blacksad as number 4 on my annual Nexus Graphica best graphic novels of the year countdown.

The beautiful Dark Horse hardback volume collects the first three adventures at an affordable $29.99. Considering the amazing quality of the work combined with the fact that the previous English-language editions of the first two tales were selling in the neighborhood of $100 each and that this edition contained the FIRST English language edition of the third story "Red Shoes", this book was a steal. No wonder it’s in high demand.

My friend messaged me about her disappointment. Surprised, I contacted Dark Horse Publicity Coordinator Jim Gibbons directly about the rumor. He promptly replied:

That makes me (and my friend) happy. She ordered a copy online and I’m now free to once again to continue recommending Blacksad with abandon!

Let’s take a quick look to see what’s arrived at the Geek Compound.

Let Me In

Promo copy:

From Matt Reeves – the writer/director of Cloverfield – comes the new vampire classic that critics are calling “chillingly real” (Scott Bowles, USA Today) and “one of the best horror films of the year” (Cinematical). In bleak New Mexico, a lonely, bullied boy, Owen (Kodi Smit-McPhee of The Road), forms a unique bond with his mysterious new neighbor, Abby (Chloë Grace Moretz of Kick-Ass). Trapped in the mind and body of a child, however, Abby is forced to hide a horrific secret of bloodthirsty survival. But in a world of both tenderness and terror, how can you invite in the one friend who may unleash the ultimate nightmare?

Based on the Swedish novel, Let the Right One In, “Let Me In is a dark and violent love story, a beautiful piece of cinema and a respectful rendering of my novel for which I am grateful.” (John Ajvide Lindqvist, author).

I haven’t seen this one yet, though I loved the Swedish version Let the Right One In. Fellow reviewer Derek Johnson said over at SF Signal: "As remakes go, it’s certainly one of the better ones." Good enough for me. Perhaps I’ll check it out.

Ryder on the Storm Issue 2
Written by: David Hine
Illustrated by: Wayne Nichols
Cover Art by: Francesco "Matt" Mattina

Promo copy:

Ryder learns the truth about his heritage and Charles Monk’s mysterious Order of the Sacred Blood – and what he must do to stop the Dantons from rising to power. After discovering that a Daemon hive queen still lives beneath their city, Monk and Ryder enter the catacombs to exterminate the queen and her brood – but when Ryder takes the fight to Rebecca Danton, he learns of a terrible secret that will shed new light on the mystery of his murdered brother.

Bloodshot
by Cherie Priest
Cover by Jae Song

Promo copy:

VAMPIRE FOR HIRE

Raylene Pendle (AKA Cheshire Red), a vampire and world-renowned thief, doesn’t usually hang with her own kind. She’s too busy stealing priceless art and rare jewels. But when the infuriatingly charming Ian Stott asks for help, Raylene finds him impossible to resist—even though Ian doesn’t want precious artifacts. He wants her to retrieve missing government files—documents that deal with the secret biological experiments that left Ian blind. What Raylene doesn’t bargain for is a case that takes her from the wilds of Minneapolis to the mean streets of Atlanta. And with a psychotic, power-hungry scientist on her trail, a kick-ass drag queen on her side, and Men in Black popping up at the most inconvenient moments, the case proves to be one hell of a ride.

Cowboy Angels
by Paul McAuley
Cover by Sparth

Promo copy:

The first Turing gate, a mere hundred nanometers across, is forced open in 1963, at the high-energy physics laboratory in Brookhaven; three years later, the first man to travel to an alternate history takes his momentous step, and an empire is born.
For fifteen years, the version of America that calls itself the Real has used its Turing gate technology to infiltrate a wide variety of alternate Americas, rebuilding those wrecked by nuclear war, fomenting revolutions and waging war to free others from communist or fascist rule, and establishing a Pan-American Alliance. Then a nation exhausted by endless strife elects Jimmy Carter on a reconstruction and reconciliation ticket, the CIA’s covert operations are wound down, and the Real begins to wage peace rather than war.

But some people believe that it is the Real’s manifest destiny to impose its idea of truth, justice, and the American way in every known alternate history, and they’re prepared to do anything to reverse Carter’s peacenik doctrine. When Adam Stone, a former CIA field officer, one of the Cowboy Angels who worked covertly in other histories, volunteers for reactivation after an old friend begins a killing spree across alternate histories, his mission uncovers a startling secret about the operation of the Turing gates and leads him into the heart of an audicious conspiracy to change the history of every America in the multiverse–including our own.

Cowboy Angels is a vivid, helter-skelter thriller in which one version of America discovers the true cost of empire building, and one man discovers that an individual really can make a difference.

Earp: Saints and Sinners Issue 1
Created by: Matt Cirulnick & David Manpearl
Written by: M. Zachary Sherman
Illustrated by: Mack Chater & Martin Montiel
Cover art by: Alex Maleev

Promo copy:

In a world where the American economy has collapsed, bandits roam the country and the law is as corrupt as the criminals its sworn to stop, one lawman remains a steadfast moral compass for the people: WYATT EARP. After a violent assignment claims the life of his brother, Wyatt sets out to forge a simple life in the only boomtown left: Las Vegas. Though Earp no longer wears a U.S. Marshall’s badge, his past is about to catch up to him. With nearly everything to lose, Earp will have to beat the odds stacked against him in order to bring old-fashioned justice to Sin City.