Last month in anticipation of the releases of Battle: Los Angeles, Mars Needs Moms and Paul, for Moving Pictures I compiled a top ten list of the best alien movies. Out of curiosity, I researched the streaming availability of the films. I referenced Netflix, Amazon Prime, Crackle, Hulu, Hulu Plus, and the Internet Archive. As a service to the Geek Curmudgeon faithful, I present my findings.

10. District 9

Netflix

9. The War of the Worlds (1953)

Currently not available.

8. Superman (1978)

Netflix

7. The Thing (1982)

Netflix

6. The Iron Giant

Netflix

5. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)

Currently not available, but Netflix does offer the excellent 1978 remake.

4. Alien

Currently not available.

3. Aliens

Netflix

2. Close Encounters of the Third Kind

Netflix

1. Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)

Currently not available.

Very disappointing. Only six available for streaming and only via Netflix. If you want to catch all of these films, you need to rent some DVDs.

*Word of caution. This info is accurate as of April 20, 2011. The availability of streaming titles is nearly always in flux. YMMV.*

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

Hyenas
by Joe R. Lansdale
Cover by Glen Orbik

Promo copy:

Hyenas marks the always-welcome return of Joe R. Lansdale’s most indelible fictional creations: Hap Collins and Leonard Pine. Once again, the embattled but resilient duo find themselves enmeshed in a web of danger, duplicity, and escalating mayhem. The result is a tightly compressed novella that is at once harrowing, hilarious, and utterly impossible to put down.

The story begins with a barroom brawl that is both brutal and oddly comic. The ensuing drama encompasses abduction, betrayal, robbery, and murder, ending with a lethal confrontation in an East Texas pasture. Along the way, readers are treated to moments of raucous, casually profane humor and to scenes of vivid, crisply described violence, all related in that unmistakable Lansdale voice. An essential addition to an already imposing body of work, Hyenas shows us both the author and his signature characters at their inimitable best. It doesn’t get better than this.

Hyenas also includes the bonus Hap Collins short story, “The Boy Who Became Invisible”.

Crucified Dreams
Edited by Joe R. Lansdale

Promo copy:

Crossing noir with the supernatural, this luridly visceral anthology attacks polite society and plunges into the unthinkable horrors lurking in its underbelly. Searching for some beauty in a time of increasing poverty and neglect, the desperate are all the more menacing, and in a brief moment, ordinary people turn into something far less human. Offering stylish yet savage tales of private dicks, serial killers, lurking demons, and femme fatales, these surreal and often bloody tales provide glimpses into sinister worlds that mirror our own. Boasting an intriguing assortment of stories from celebrated authors such as Harlan Ellison, David Morrell, and the infamous editor himself, each gritty and sensational undertaking proves that being human is a far cry from being civilized.

Table of Contents

Introduction by Joe R. Lansdale
The Whimper of Whipped Dogs by Harlan Ellison®
The Monster by Joe Haldeman
The Mojave Two-Step by Norman Partridge
Front Man by David Morrell
Interrogation B by Charlie Huston
The Quickening by Michael Bishop
The Evening and the Morning and the Night by Octavia E. Butler
Love in Vain by Lewis Shiner
Beast of the Heartland by Lucius Shepard
Coffins on the River by Jeffrey Ford
Game Night at the Fox and Goose by Karen Joy Fowler
Copping Squid by Michael Shea
Access Fantasy by Jonathan Lethem
Singing on a Star by Ellen Klages
Quitters, Inc. by Stephen King
Nightbeat by Neal Barrett, Jr.
Window by Bob Leman
The Pit by Joe R. Lansdale
Loss by Tom Piccirilli

Christmas With the Dead
by Joe R. Lansdale
Cover by Glenn Chadbourne

Promo copy:

The Christmas spirit never dies… even after people started becoming zombies. Haunted by memories of Christmas past, and after years of monotony of loneliness and the grief of losing his family and everyone he knows, Calvin, feeling he can take it no more… decides its Christmas.

Legendary genre author Joe R. Lansdale gives us the gift of a holiday story about madness, loss, and the will to survive when everything worth living for in life is dead.

Soon to be a motion picture, executive produced by Lansdale, his ownself, directed by Terrill Lee Lankford with a script by Keith Lansdale.

Books received 4/19/11 Joe R. Lansdale edition was originally published on The Geek Curmudgeon

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

Hyenas
by Joe R. Lansdale
Cover by Glen Orbik

Promo copy:

Hyenas marks the always-welcome return of Joe R. Lansdale’s most indelible fictional creations: Hap Collins and Leonard Pine. Once again, the embattled but resilient duo find themselves enmeshed in a web of danger, duplicity, and escalating mayhem. The result is a tightly compressed novella that is at once harrowing, hilarious, and utterly impossible to put down.

The story begins with a barroom brawl that is both brutal and oddly comic. The ensuing drama encompasses abduction, betrayal, robbery, and murder, ending with a lethal confrontation in an East Texas pasture. Along the way, readers are treated to moments of raucous, casually profane humor and to scenes of vivid, crisply described violence, all related in that unmistakable Lansdale voice. An essential addition to an already imposing body of work, Hyenas shows us both the author and his signature characters at their inimitable best. It doesn’t get better than this.

Hyenas also includes the bonus Hap Collins short story, "The Boy Who Became Invisible".

Crucified Dreams
Edited by Joe R. Lansdale

Promo copy:

Crossing noir with the supernatural, this luridly visceral anthology attacks polite society and plunges into the unthinkable horrors lurking in its underbelly. Searching for some beauty in a time of increasing poverty and neglect, the desperate are all the more menacing, and in a brief moment, ordinary people turn into something far less human. Offering stylish yet savage tales of private dicks, serial killers, lurking demons, and femme fatales, these surreal and often bloody tales provide glimpses into sinister worlds that mirror our own. Boasting an intriguing assortment of stories from celebrated authors such as Harlan Ellison, David Morrell, and the infamous editor himself, each gritty and sensational undertaking proves that being human is a far cry from being civilized.

Table of Contents

Introduction by Joe R. Lansdale
The Whimper of Whipped Dogs by Harlan Ellison®
The Monster by Joe Haldeman
The Mojave Two-Step by Norman Partridge
Front Man by David Morrell
Interrogation B by Charlie Huston
The Quickening by Michael Bishop
The Evening and the Morning and the Night by Octavia E. Butler
Love in Vain by Lewis Shiner
Beast of the Heartland by Lucius Shepard
Coffins on the River by Jeffrey Ford
Game Night at the Fox and Goose by Karen Joy Fowler
Copping Squid by Michael Shea
Access Fantasy by Jonathan Lethem
Singing on a Star by Ellen Klages
Quitters, Inc. by Stephen King
Nightbeat by Neal Barrett, Jr.
Window by Bob Leman
The Pit by Joe R. Lansdale
Loss by Tom Piccirilli

Christmas With the Dead
by Joe R. Lansdale
Cover by Glenn Chadbourne

Promo copy:

The Christmas spirit never dies… even after people started becoming zombies. Haunted by memories of Christmas past, and after years of monotony of loneliness and the grief of losing his family and everyone he knows, Calvin, feeling he can take it no more… decides its Christmas.

Legendary genre author Joe R. Lansdale gives us the gift of a holiday story about madness, loss, and the will to survive when everything worth living for in life is dead.

Soon to be a motion picture, executive produced by Lansdale, his ownself, directed by Terrill Lee Lankford with a script by Keith Lansdale.

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

Ghosts of War
by George Mann
Cover by Benjamíne Carré

Promo copy:

NEW YORK CITY IS BEING PLAGUED BY A PACK OF FEROCIOUS BRASS RAPTORS…

…strange, skeletonlike creations with batlike wings that swoop out of the sky, attacking people and carrying them away into the night. The Ghost has been tracking these bizarre machines, and is close to finding their origin: a deranged military scientist who is slowly rebuilding himself as a machine.

However, this scientist is not working alone, and his scheme involves more than a handful of abductions. He is part of a plot to escalate the cold war with Britain into a full-blown conflict, and he is building a weapon—a weapon that will fracture dimensional space and allow the monstrous creatures that live on the other side to spill through. He and his coconspirators—a cabal of senators and businessmen who seek to benefit from the war—intend to harness these creatures and use them as a means to crush the British.

But the Ghost knows only too well how dangerous these creatures can be, and the threat they represent not just to Britain, but the world. The Ghost’s efforts to put an end to the conspiracy bring him into an uneasy alliance with a male British spy, who is loose in Manhattan protecting the interests of his country. He also has the unlikely assistance of Ginny, a drunken ex-lover and sharpshooter, who walks back into his life, having disappeared six years earlier in mysterious circumstances.

While suffering from increasingly lucid flashbacks to WWI, the Ghost is subjected to rooftop chases, a battle with a mechanized madman, and the constant threat of airborne predators, while the fate of the world hangs in the balance. Can he derail the conspiracy and prevent the war with the British from escalating beyond control?

Wolfsangel
by M. D. Lachlan
Cover by Paul Young

Promo copy:

The Viking king Authun leads his men on a raid against an Anglo-Saxon village. Men and women are killed indiscriminately, but Authun demands that no child be touched. He is acting on prophecy—a prophecy that tells him that the Saxons have stolen a child from the gods. If Authun, in turn, takes the child and raises him as an heir, the child will lead his people to glory.
But Authun discovers not one child, but twin baby boys. After ensuring that his faithful warriors, witnesses to what has happened, die during the raid, Authun takes the children and their mother home, back to the witches who live on the troll wall. And he places his destiny in their hands.

So begins a stunning multivolume fantasy epic that will take a werewolf from his beginnings as the heir to a brutal Viking king down through the ages. It is a journey that will see him hunt for his lost love through centuries and lives, and see the endless battle between the wolf, Odin, and Loki, the eternal trickster, spill over into countless bloody conflicts from our history and our lives.

This is the myth of the werewolf as it has never been told before and marks the beginning of an extraordinary new fantasy series.

Sword of Fire and Sea: The Chaos Knight, Book One
by Erin Hoffman
Cover by Dehong He

Promo copy:

Three generations ago Captain Vidarian Rulorat’s great-grandfather gave up an imperial commission to marry a fire priestess. For love, he unwittingly obligated his descendants to an allegiance with the High Temple of Kara’zul, domain of the fire priestesses. Now Vidarian, the last surviving member of the Rulorat family, struggles to uphold his family’s legacy. The priestess Endera has called upon Vidarian to fulfill his family’s obligation by transporting a young fire priestess named Ariadel to a water temple far to the south, through dangerous pirate-controlled territory. A journey perilous in the best of conditions is made more so by their pursuers: rogue telepathic images called the Vkortha who will stop at nothing to recover Ariadel, who has witnessed their forbidden rites. Together, Vidarian and Ariadel will navigate more than treacherous waters: imperial intrigue, a world that has been slowly losing its magic for generations, secrets that the priestesshoods have kept for longer, the indifference of their elemental goddesses, gryphons – once thought mythical – now returning to the world, and their own labyrinthine family legacies.

The Alchemist in the Shadows
by Pierre Pevel
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…

Books received 4/18/11 Pyr edition was originally published on The Geek Curmudgeon

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

Ghosts of War
by George Mann
Cover by Benjamíne Carré

Promo copy:

NEW YORK CITY IS BEING PLAGUED BY A PACK OF FEROCIOUS BRASS RAPTORS…

…strange, skeletonlike creations with batlike wings that swoop out of the sky, attacking people and carrying them away into the night. The Ghost has been tracking these bizarre machines, and is close to finding their origin: a deranged military scientist who is slowly rebuilding himself as a machine.

However, this scientist is not working alone, and his scheme involves more than a handful of abductions. He is part of a plot to escalate the cold war with Britain into a full-blown conflict, and he is building a weapon—a weapon that will fracture dimensional space and allow the monstrous creatures that live on the other side to spill through. He and his coconspirators—a cabal of senators and businessmen who seek to benefit from the war—intend to harness these creatures and use them as a means to crush the British.

But the Ghost knows only too well how dangerous these creatures can be, and the threat they represent not just to Britain, but the world. The Ghost’s efforts to put an end to the conspiracy bring him into an uneasy alliance with a male British spy, who is loose in Manhattan protecting the interests of his country. He also has the unlikely assistance of Ginny, a drunken ex-lover and sharpshooter, who walks back into his life, having disappeared six years earlier in mysterious circumstances.

While suffering from increasingly lucid flashbacks to WWI, the Ghost is subjected to rooftop chases, a battle with a mechanized madman, and the constant threat of airborne predators, while the fate of the world hangs in the balance. Can he derail the conspiracy and prevent the war with the British from escalating beyond control?

Wolfsangel
by M. D. Lachlan
Cover by Paul Young

Promo copy:

The Viking king Authun leads his men on a raid against an Anglo-Saxon village. Men and women are killed indiscriminately, but Authun demands that no child be touched. He is acting on prophecy—a prophecy that tells him that the Saxons have stolen a child from the gods. If Authun, in turn, takes the child and raises him as an heir, the child will lead his people to glory.
But Authun discovers not one child, but twin baby boys. After ensuring that his faithful warriors, witnesses to what has happened, die during the raid, Authun takes the children and their mother home, back to the witches who live on the troll wall. And he places his destiny in their hands.

So begins a stunning multivolume fantasy epic that will take a werewolf from his beginnings as the heir to a brutal Viking king down through the ages. It is a journey that will see him hunt for his lost love through centuries and lives, and see the endless battle between the wolf, Odin, and Loki, the eternal trickster, spill over into countless bloody conflicts from our history and our lives.

This is the myth of the werewolf as it has never been told before and marks the beginning of an extraordinary new fantasy series.

Sword of Fire and Sea: The Chaos Knight, Book One
by Erin Hoffman
Cover by Dehong He

Promo copy:

Three generations ago Captain Vidarian Rulorat’s great-grandfather gave up an imperial commission to marry a fire priestess. For love, he unwittingly obligated his descendants to an allegiance with the High Temple of Kara’zul, domain of the fire priestesses. Now Vidarian, the last surviving member of the Rulorat family, struggles to uphold his family’s legacy. The priestess Endera has called upon Vidarian to fulfill his family’s obligation by transporting a young fire priestess named Ariadel to a water temple far to the south, through dangerous pirate-controlled territory. A journey perilous in the best of conditions is made more so by their pursuers: rogue telepathic images called the Vkortha who will stop at nothing to recover Ariadel, who has witnessed their forbidden rites. Together, Vidarian and Ariadel will navigate more than treacherous waters: imperial intrigue, a world that has been slowly losing its magic for generations, secrets that the priestesshoods have kept for longer, the indifference of their elemental goddesses, gryphons – once thought mythical – now returning to the world, and their own labyrinthine family legacies.

The Alchemist in the Shadows
by Pierre Pevel
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…

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

Retribution Falls
by Chris Wooding
Cover by Stephan Martiniere

Promo copy:

Sky piracy is a bit out of Darian Frey’s league. Fate has not been kind to the captain of the airship Ketty Jay—or his motley crew. They are all running from something. Crake is a daemonist in hiding, traveling with an armored golem and burdened by guilt. Jez is the new navigator, desperate to keep her secret from the rest of the crew. Malvery is a disgraced doctor, drinking himself to death. So when an opportunity arises to steal a chest of gems from a vulnerable airship, Frey can’t pass it up. It’s an easy take—and the payoff will finally make him a rich man.

But when the attack goes horribly wrong, Frey suddenly finds himself the most wanted man in Vardia, trailed by bounty hunters, the elite Century Knights, and the dread queen of the skies, Trinica Dracken. Frey realizes that they’ve been set up to take a fall but doesn’t know the endgame. And the ultimate answer for captain and crew may lie in the legendary hidden pirate town of Retribution Falls. That’s if they can get there without getting blown out of the sky.

The Hidden Goddess
by M. K. Hobson
Cover by David Stevenson

Promo copy:

In a brilliant mix of magic, history, and romance, M. K. Hobson moves her feisty young Witch, Emily Edwards, from the Old West of 1876 to turn-of-the-nineteenth-century New York City, whose polished surfaces conceal as much danger as anything west of the Rockies.

Like it or not, Emily has fallen in love with Dreadnought Stanton, a New York Warlock as irresistible as he is insufferable. Newly engaged, she now must brave Dreadnought’s family and the magical elite of the nation’s wealthiest city. Not everyone is pleased with the impending nuptials, especially Emily’s future mother-in-law, a sociopathic socialite. But there are greater challenges still: confining couture, sinister Russian scientists, and a deathless Aztec goddess who dreams of plunging the world into apocalypse. With all they must confront, do Emily and Dreadnought have any hope of a happily-ever-after?

City of Ruin
by Mark Charan Newton

Promo copy:

In the frozen north of a far-flung world lies Villiren, a city plagued by violent gangs and monstrous human/animal hybrids, stalked by a serial killer, and targeted by an otherworldly army. Brynd Lathraea has brought his elite Night Guard to help Villiren build a fighting force against the invaders. But success will mean dealing with the half-vampyre leader of the savage Bloods gang. Meanwhile, reptilian rumel investigator Rumex Jeryd has come seeking refuge from Villjamur’s vindictive emperor—only to find a city riddled with intolerance between species, indifference to a murderer’s reign of terror, and the powerful influence of criminals. As the enemy prepares to strike, and Villiren’s defenders turn on each other, three refugees—deposed empress Jamur Rika, her sister Eir, and the scholar Randur Estevu—approach the city. And with them they bring a last, desperate hope for survival … and a shocking revelation that will change everything.

Books received 4/18/11 Ballantine Spectra edition was originally published on The Geek Curmudgeon

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

Retribution Falls
by Chris Wooding
Cover by Stephan Martiniere

Promo copy:

Sky piracy is a bit out of Darian Frey’s league. Fate has not been kind to the captain of the airship Ketty Jay—or his motley crew. They are all running from something. Crake is a daemonist in hiding, traveling with an armored golem and burdened by guilt. Jez is the new navigator, desperate to keep her secret from the rest of the crew. Malvery is a disgraced doctor, drinking himself to death. So when an opportunity arises to steal a chest of gems from a vulnerable airship, Frey can’t pass it up. It’s an easy take—and the payoff will finally make him a rich man.

But when the attack goes horribly wrong, Frey suddenly finds himself the most wanted man in Vardia, trailed by bounty hunters, the elite Century Knights, and the dread queen of the skies, Trinica Dracken. Frey realizes that they’ve been set up to take a fall but doesn’t know the endgame. And the ultimate answer for captain and crew may lie in the legendary hidden pirate town of Retribution Falls. That’s if they can get there without getting blown out of the sky.

The Hidden Goddess
by M. K. Hobson
Cover by David Stevenson

Promo copy:

In a brilliant mix of magic, history, and romance, M. K. Hobson moves her feisty young Witch, Emily Edwards, from the Old West of 1876 to turn-of-the-nineteenth-century New York City, whose polished surfaces conceal as much danger as anything west of the Rockies.

Like it or not, Emily has fallen in love with Dreadnought Stanton, a New York Warlock as irresistible as he is insufferable. Newly engaged, she now must brave Dreadnought’s family and the magical elite of the nation’s wealthiest city. Not everyone is pleased with the impending nuptials, especially Emily’s future mother-in-law, a sociopathic socialite. But there are greater challenges still: confining couture, sinister Russian scientists, and a deathless Aztec goddess who dreams of plunging the world into apocalypse. With all they must confront, do Emily and Dreadnought have any hope of a happily-ever-after?

City of Ruin
by Mark Charan Newton

Promo copy:

In the frozen north of a far-flung world lies Villiren, a city plagued by violent gangs and monstrous human/animal hybrids, stalked by a serial killer, and targeted by an otherworldly army. Brynd Lathraea has brought his elite Night Guard to help Villiren build a fighting force against the invaders. But success will mean dealing with the half-vampyre leader of the savage Bloods gang. Meanwhile, reptilian rumel investigator Rumex Jeryd has come seeking refuge from Villjamur’s vindictive emperor—only to find a city riddled with intolerance between species, indifference to a murderer’s reign of terror, and the powerful influence of criminals. As the enemy prepares to strike, and Villiren’s defenders turn on each other, three refugees—deposed empress Jamur Rika, her sister Eir, and the scholar Randur Estevu—approach the city. And with them they bring a last, desperate hope for survival . . . and a shocking revelation that will change everything.

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

Mister Wonderful
by Daniel Clowes

Promo copy:

The fan-favorite Eisner Award-winning story, originally seri­alized in The New York Times Magazine, now collected and with forty pages of new material.

Meet Marshall. Sitting alone in the local coffee place. He’s been set up by his friend Tim on a blind date with someone named Natalie, and now he’s just feeling set up. She’s nine minutes late and counting. Who was he kidding anyway? Divorced, middle-aged, newly unemployed, with next to no prospects, Marshall isn’t exactly what you’d call a catch. Twenty minutes pass.

A half hour. Marshall orders a scotch. (He wasn’t going to drink!) Forty minutes.

Then, after nearly an hour, when he’s long since given up hope, Natalie appears—breathless, apologizing profusely that she went to the wrong place. She takes a seat, to Marshall’s utter amazement.

She’s too good to be true: attractive, young, intelligent, and she seems to be seriously engaged with what Marshall has to say. There has to be a catch.

And, of course, there is.

During the extremely long night that follows, Marshall and Natalie are emotionally tested in ways that two people who just met really should not be. Not, at least, if they want the prospect of a second date.

A captivating, bittersweet, and hilarious look at the potential for human connection in an increasingly hopeless world, Mister Wonderful more than lives up to its name.

I reviewed this in the most recent Nexus Graphica column.

The King’s Speech

Promo copy:

After the death of his father King George V (Michael Gambon) and the scandalous abdication of King Edward VIII (Guy Pearce), Bertie (Colin Firth) who has suffered from a debilitating speech impediment all his life, is suddenly crowned King George VI of England. With his country on the brink of war and in desperate need of a leader, his wife, Elizabeth (Helena Bonham Carter), the future Queen Mother, arranges for her husband to see an eccentric speech therapist, Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush). After a rough start, the two delve into an unorthodox course of treatment and eventually form an unbreakable bond. With the support of Logue, his family, his government and Winston Churchill (Timothy Spall), the King will overcome his stammer and deliver a radio-address that inspires his people and unites them in battle. Based on the true story of King George VI, THE KING’S SPEECH follows the Royal Monarch’s quest to find his voice.

Stumptown Volume 1: The Case of the Girl Who Took Her Shampoo (But Left her Mini)
Written by Greg Rucka
Art by Matthew Southworth

Promo copy:

Dex Parios is the proprietor of Stumptown Investigations, and a fairly talented P.I. Unfortunately, sh’s less adept at throwing dice than solving cases. Her recent streak has left her beyond broke – she’s in to the Confederated Tribes of the Wind Coast for 18 large. But maybe Dex’s luck is about to change. Sue-Lynne, head of the Wind Coast’s casino operation, will clear Dex’s debt if she can locate Sue-Lynne’s missing granddaughter. But is this job Dex’s way out of the hole or a shove down one much much deeper?

Stuff received 4/17/11 was originally published on The Geek Curmudgeon

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

Mister Wonderful
by Daniel Clowes

Promo copy:

The fan-favorite Eisner Award-winning story, originally seri­alized in The New York Times Magazine, now collected and with forty pages of new material.

Meet Marshall. Sitting alone in the local coffee place. He’s been set up by his friend Tim on a blind date with someone named Natalie, and now he’s just feeling set up. She’s nine minutes late and counting. Who was he kidding anyway? Divorced, middle-aged, newly unemployed, with next to no prospects, Marshall isn’t exactly what you’d call a catch. Twenty minutes pass.

A half hour. Marshall orders a scotch. (He wasn’t going to drink!) Forty minutes.

Then, after nearly an hour, when he’s long since given up hope, Natalie appears—breathless, apologizing profusely that she went to the wrong place. She takes a seat, to Marshall’s utter amazement.

She’s too good to be true: attractive, young, intelligent, and she seems to be seriously engaged with what Marshall has to say. There has to be a catch.

And, of course, there is.

During the extremely long night that follows, Marshall and Natalie are emotionally tested in ways that two people who just met really should not be. Not, at least, if they want the prospect of a second date.

A captivating, bittersweet, and hilarious look at the potential for human connection in an increasingly hopeless world, Mister Wonderful more than lives up to its name.

I reviewed this in the most recent Nexus Graphica column.

The King’s Speech

Promo copy:

After the death of his father King George V (Michael Gambon) and the scandalous abdication of King Edward VIII (Guy Pearce), Bertie (Colin Firth) who has suffered from a debilitating speech impediment all his life, is suddenly crowned King George VI of England. With his country on the brink of war and in desperate need of a leader, his wife, Elizabeth (Helena Bonham Carter), the future Queen Mother, arranges for her husband to see an eccentric speech therapist, Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush). After a rough start, the two delve into an unorthodox course of treatment and eventually form an unbreakable bond. With the support of Logue, his family, his government and Winston Churchill (Timothy Spall), the King will overcome his stammer and deliver a radio-address that inspires his people and unites them in battle. Based on the true story of King George VI, THE KING’S SPEECH follows the Royal Monarch’s quest to find his voice.

Stumptown Volume 1: The Case of the Girl Who Took Her Shampoo (But Left her Mini)
Written by Greg Rucka
Art by Matthew Southworth

Promo copy:

Dex Parios is the proprietor of Stumptown Investigations, and a fairly talented P.I. Unfortunately, sh’s less adept at throwing dice than solving cases. Her recent streak has left her beyond broke – she’s in to the Confederated Tribes of the Wind Coast for 18 large. But maybe Dex’s luck is about to change. Sue-Lynne, head of the Wind Coast’s casino operation, will clear Dex’s debt if she can locate Sue-Lynne’s missing granddaughter. But is this job Dex’s way out of the hole or a shove down one much much deeper?

The third Jeff VanderMeer-helmed book of steampunkiana, The Steampunk Bible, premieres on May 1st. This time VanderMeer enlisted the aide of Poe scholar S.J. Chambers for the main part of the book and a cadre of “experts” as contributors on various aspects of the popular sub-genre.

Luckily for those folks in Austin, S. J. Chambers will be in town on Sunday, May 1st and has arranged a special event along with contributors Rick Klaw and Jess Nevins as well as other special guests to commemorate the release of this extraordinary book. The signing/party/steampunk love fest, happens at the United States Art Authority, 7-9 PM.

I’m looking forward to The Steampunk Bible, which includes my essay on steampunk television. Here’s what the publisher’s site has to say about the book:

On his blog, VanderMeer included a preview to some of the beautiful interiors. I can’t wait to get my copy.

Endpapers by James Ng

Hope to see everyone on May 1st, 7-9 PM at the United States Art Authority.

Steampunk Bible book release party was originally published on The Geek Curmudgeon