From 2003-2007, I produced the monthly email newsletter, "All the GEEK That’s Fit To Print" that kept subscribers to my GeekConfidential e-group appraised of my monthly happenings. As part of my missives, I also recounted what I was currently reading. Perhaps the most mentioned aspect of the newsletter appeared under this heading: And since what I’m reading in the bathroom fascinates many of you.

With the advent of the Geek Curmudgeon blog, the newsletter became redundant and so I let it fall by the wayside, but what books are currently in my bathroom continues to fascinate, so I’ve decided to resurrect that part of the newsletter under the heading of "Readings From the Throne Room" as a regular monthly feature here at The Geek Curmudgeon.

Without further ado, here’s the current reading contents in my bathroom:

AX Volume 1: A Collection of Alternative Manga Edited by Sean Michael Wilson

This 400 page collection of alternative Japanese comic book stories represents the nearly ideal bathroom reading experience. Short stories that can be read in one sitting packaged within a paperback.

Ax reprints the stories in the traditional Japanese manner from right to left. This has become the norm for translated manga. Beggars the question though, are English-language comics that are translated into Japanese presented from left to right?

Revolver by Matt Kindt

The latest graphic novel from the creator of the excellent Super Spy recounts the flip-flopping worlds–one a post apocalyptic nightmare, the other an idealistic reality–of the unhappy Sam. Halfway through this clever exploration.

Double Play by Robert Parker

So far I’m mostly reading at this baseball novel, waiting for it to engage my full attention.

Parker: The Hunter Adaptated by Darwyn Cooke from the novel by Richard Stark

Something weird and unexpected happened over the past month. Brandy, who generally does not like her fiction "hard," discovered Donald Westlake. It started when she picked up Westlake’s final novel Memory off my best side table. She loved it and asked if I had more. In the last month she’s read 361, The Cutie, and most astoundingly the classic Richard Stark The Hunter. She loved them all and decided she wanted to read the sensational Cooke adaptation of the first Parker. And that’s how it ended up in our bathroom.

Amidst the issues of Wired, Mental Floss, MSFocus, Momentum, and Moving Pictures, lies the Fall/Winter 2010 University of Texas Press catalog. Book catalogs make for some of the best bathroom reading.

After spending most of Saturday and Sunday at my mother’s with my nephews, Alex (13) and Stan (11), I headed home with the elder nephew in tow. Alex spent the next couple of days with me and Brandy.

Visiting the Geek Compound during the summer has become a regular thing for Alex. Between playing games, watching movies, and reading comics, Brandy and I try to expose him to foods he doesn’t normally try. Last year it was Indian food (which he loved) and this year we introduced him to Vietnamese food and veggie burgers. Both proved successes.

On Sunday night we played another two games of Dominion and then we chatted. Alex and I always seem to have late night talks when he visits, primarily of a geeky nature. This time we focused on comic books.

Steve Ditko’s Spider-man

Alex innocently mentioned that Stan Lee created Spider-man and the Fantastic Four. As most serious comic book fans can tell you, Lee co-created the iconic characters. I proceeded to educate the nephew. I showed him the collections of the Ditko Spider-mans. He noted how much the they looked like the movies. (I, of course corrected him. The movies looked like the comics.) Then I told him about Jack Kirby and the Fantastic Four. He actually muttered, "Jack who?" *sigh* Teaching the next geek generation is never done.

Jack Kirby from 2001: A Space Odyssey

I attempted the impossible task of explaining The King, when I decided it’d be easier to just show him. I pulled a copy of Mark Evanier’s loving memoir Kirby: King of Comics off the shelf. Alex opened the book. His eyes went wide, and he managed a weak "Wow." He flipped through the book, stunned by what he saw. He couldn’t believe the quality; how utterly cool it was; the detail; the excitement. He’d never seen anything quite like it. It blew his young mind. The whole sequence warmed my geeky heart.

I left the stunned Alex flipping through the gorgeous book and wandered off to bed.

The following morning, we continued our game playing frenzy with Memoir ’44, but that’s a story for the next installment.

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

AX Volume 1: A Collection of Alternative Manga Edited by Sean Michael Wilson

Promo copy:

With an introduction by Paul Gravett, author of Manga: 60 Years of Japanese Comics!

Ax is the premier Japanese magazine for alternative comics, heir to the legendary Garo. Published bi-monthly since 1998, the pages of Ax contain the most innovative, experimental, and personal works in contemporary manga — the flourishing underground of the world’s largest comics industry. Now Top Shelf presents a 400-page collection of stories from ten years of Ax history, translated into English for the first time.

This landmark volume includes work by 33 artists, including Yoshihiro Tatsumi (A Drifting Life), Imiri Sakabashira (The Box Man), Kazuichi Hanawa (Doing Time), Yusaku Hanakuma (Tokyo Zombie), Akino Kondoh, Shin’ichi Abe, and many many more! It’s a feast of pure creativity, and a guided tour of fascinating new directions in Japanese comics. Ready for adventure? Then grab your Ax and come on!

Game of Cages by Harry Connolly

Promo copy:

A SECRET HIGH-STAKES AUCTION

As a wealthy few gather to bid on a predator capable of destroying all life on earth, the sorcerers of the Twenty Palace Society mobilize to stop them. Caught up in the scramble is Ray Lilly, the lowest of the low in the society—an ex–car thief and the expendable assistant of a powerful sorcerer. Ray possesses exactly one spell to his name, along with a strong left hook. But when he arrives in the small town in the North Cascades where the bidding is to take place, the predator has escaped and the society’s most powerful enemies are desperate to recapture it. All Ray has to do is survive until help arrives. But it may already be too late.

Elfsorrow (Legends of the Raven 1) by James Barclay

Promo copy:

Another action-packed adventure from the new master of fantasy. The Raven travel to a new continent in search of mages to help the ruined college of Julatsa rebuild and find themselves in the midst of an ancient curse—a curse that has unleashed a plague that threatens to wipe out the elven race. Barclay excels with another tale that pitches The Raven against the clock and unseen foes. Full of desperate fights and secret betrayals, the story also fills in more of Balaia’s history and delves deeper into the ancient emnities between the colleges. Barclay has created a wonderfully appealing group of heroes, and with every book their history grows and the land they live in becomes wider and richer. This is landmark fantasy in the making.

More in Part II

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

Noise by Darin Bradley

Promo copy:

This haunting debut from a brilliant new voice is sure to be as captivating as it is controversial, a shocking look at the imminent collapse of American civilization—and what will succeed it.

In the aftermath of the switch from analog to digital TV, an anarchic movement known as Salvage hijacks the unused airwaves. Mixed in with the static’s random noise are dire warnings of the imminent economic, political, and social collapse of civilization—and cold-blooded lessons on how to survive the fall and prosper in the harsh new order that will inevitably arise from the ashes of the old.

Hiram and Levi are two young men, former Scouts and veterans of countless Dungeons & Dragons campaigns. Now, on the blood-drenched battlefields of university campuses, shopping malls, and gated communities, they will find themselves taking on new identities and new moralities as they lead a ragtag band of hackers and misfits to an all-but-mythical place called Amaranth, where a fragile future waits to be born.

Gears of War: Anvil Gate by Karen Traviss

Promo copy:

Continuing the saga of the bestselling game series!

With the Locust Horde apparently destroyed, Jacinto’s survivors have begun to rebuild human society on the Locusts’ stronghold. Raiding pirate gangs take a toll—but it’s nothing that Marcus Fenix and the Gears can’t handle. Then the nightmare that they thought they’d left behind begins to stalk them again. Something far worse, something even the Locust dreaded, has emerged to spread across the planet, and not even this remote island haven is beyond its reach. Gears and Stranded must fight side by side to survive their deadliest enemy yet, falling back on the savage tactics of another bloody siege—Anvil Gate.

When Blood Calls by J. K. Beck

Promo copy:

Attorney Sara Constantine is thrilled with her promotion—until she finds out that she must now prosecute vampires and werewolves. The first defendant she’ll be trying to put away? Lucius Dragos, the sexy stranger with whom she recently shared an explosive night of ecstasy.

When Lucius kisses a beautiful woman sitting next to him at the bar, he’s hoping only to avoid the perceptive gaze of the man he’s planning to kill. But what starts as a simple kiss ignites into an all-consuming passion. Charged with murder, Luke knows that Sara is determined to see him locked away—unless he can convince her that he’s not a monster. And that might mean making the ultimate sacrifice.

More in Part III

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

Shadowheart (Legends of the Raven 2) by James Barclay

Promo copy:

The second of James Barclay’s Legends of The Raven trilogy sees Barclay up the ante yet again and throw Balaia into a full blown war. Barclay has never been afraid of killing off favourite characters, but now in the latest of his blisteringly paced, all-action heroic fantasies he puts The Raven through a trial that all of them will be hard pressed to survive. Barclay has proved himself to be the most successful fantasy writer of his generation. With 200,000 copies in print, Chronicles and Legends of the Raven are building into landmark fantasy.

The Native Star by M. K. Hobson

Promo copy:

In the tradition of Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, this brilliant first novel fuses history, fantasy, and romance. Prepare to be enchanted by M. K. Hobson’s captivating take on the Wild, Wild West.

The year is 1876. In the small Sierra Nevada settlement of Lost Pine, the town witch, Emily Edwards, is being run out of business by an influx of mail-order patent magics. Attempting to solve her problem with a love spell, Emily only makes things worse. But before she can undo the damage, an enchanted artifact falls into her possession—and suddenly Emily must flee for her life, pursued by evil warlocks who want the object for themselves.

Dreadnought Stanton, a warlock from New York City whose personality is as pompous and abrasive as his name, has been exiled to Lost Pine for mysterious reasons. Now he finds himself involuntarily allied with Emily in a race against time—and across the United States by horse, train, and biomechanical flying machine—in quest of the great Professor Mirabilis, who alone can unlock the secret of the coveted artifact. But along the way, Emily and Stanton will be forced to contend with the most powerful and unpredictable magic of all—the magic of the human heart.

Creating Animated Cartoons with Character: A Guide to Developing and Producing Your Own Series for TV, the Web, and Short Film by Joe Murray

Promo copy:

From the Emmy Award-winning creator of Rocko’s Modern Life and Camp Lazlo comes Creating Animated Cartoons with Character, a comprehensive, fully illustrated guide to creating and producing a successful animated series for television, short film, and the Web. Joe Murray offers his substantial wisdom and expertise – honed from more than twenty years in the business – in creating and producing characters adn stories in an authoritative yet conversational narrative that answers such questions as: How do you create good characters? How do you conceive the world they inhabit and tell their stories? And once you’ve breathed life into your ideas, how do you successfully pitch your series to a network?

This book won’t tell you what characters to create or how to draw them. What it will do is guide you in discovering and exploring your own creative sweet spots and help you to navigate the process that links your unique artistic vision with the realities of producing a commercial cartoon. Packed with art and photos from Murray’s many film and television projects, as well as behind-the-scenes anecdotes and insider advice from such highly successful contemporaries as Steve Hillenburg (SpongeBob Squarepants), Everett Peck (Duckman), and Craig McCracken (The Powerpuff Girls and Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends), this book explores in detail the importance of character and story hooks; how to put together pitch materials; what goes into producing a series pilot; and how to build the best creative team to produce your show. Whether you’re an aspiring cartoonist, experienced animator, hardcore fan, or you simply like to draw and tell stories, Creating Animated Cartoons with Character is the ultimate entrée into the world of animated cartooning from a master of the craft.

More in Part I

I spent a good portion of the past week with my uber-geek-in-training nephews. As with Alex‘s (13) and Stanley‘s (11) previous summer visits, a good time was had by all.

It started on Saturday when I went to my mother’s place. Sadly, Stanley, who suffers from severe cat allergies, can’t stay at my place with my 20 lb Tortoise-Shell hellion Kali. When he’s in town, I often spend the night with him at his grandmother’s.

After greeting the nephews, my first goal was to extricate the Wesnoth-junkie Stanley from the computer. I unknowingly introduced him to the addictive Battle for Wesnoth, a turn-based tactical strategy game, when I refurbished an old pc with Xubuntu for him and his siblings.

Battle for Wesnoth image (click on image to enlarge)

Luckily for me, the boys trust my geek sensibilities, after all I introduced them to Godzilla, Dr. Who, Monty Python, Munchkin, and Sling Shot, so they eagerly followed my suggestion of Dominion. The very popular card game, currently 7th on Board Game Geek, challenges 2-4 players to build the best deck but unlike collectible card games, players all start with identical hands and the chance to attain cards from a communal set. The winner isn’t predetermined by who has previously spent the most (real) money on acquiring the best deck before the games begin but on actual skill DURING the game. At the end of the game, the cards return to the communal set and the original hands are re-dealt for a new match. Highly addictive, the fast paced game is simple to learn and entertaining.

Not surprisingly, the boys were quickly hooked and we played four games that night and then another five or so the next day. Brandy, who loves Dominion joined in the fun on Sunday afternoon. In between all that, I also showed them the classic investing game Acquire. Stanley won a vast majority of the games. That kid is an impressive game player. He has an innate ability to assess the whole game and make moves accordingly. Course, I doubt he could explain it that way. From his perspective, he’s just good at games.

On Sunday evening, Alex came home with me and Brandy, spending the next 2.5 days with us. More on that in Part II.

I wrote the review of the eagerly-anticipated, much-ballyhooed Scott Pilgrim vs. the World for Moving Pictures.

This morning I received the Fall 2010 Library of America catalog. LOA consistently produces the highest quality reprints of classic American works and I proudly own several of their volumes including Philip K. Dick: Four Novels of the 1960s, Crime Novels: American Noir of the 1930s and 40s, Crime Novels: American Noir of the 1950s, Dashiell Hammett: Crime Stories & Other Writings, Raymond Chandler: Stories & Early Novels, Raymond Chandler: Later Novels & Other Writings, Zuckerman Bound: A Trilogy & Epilogue 1979–1985 by Philip Roth, and Baseball: A Literary Anthology.

As a pop culture/comics historian and critic, I was thrilled with the new book that adorns the catalog cover. Lynd Ward: Six Novels in Woodcuts collects the prominent works of this extraordinary creator. Ward pioneered the graphic novel with his wordless "novels in woodcuts." This should be on not only my shelf but any lover of comics as well.

Image from God’s Man

Image from God’s Man

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

RASL #8 by Jeff Smith

Promo copy:

RASL receives some disturbing information about the Tesla-based project he helped to develop codenamed St George. With all of his options exhausted, RASL launches an attack on his former employers.

I had this to say about RASL Volume 1: The Drift in Nexus Graphica:

Elemental: Destiny’s Embers by Bradley Wardell

Promo copy:

At a frontier outpost on the fringes of the civilized world, an orphaned messenger named Xander witnesses the destruction of all he knows at the hands of the Fallen, the great enemy thought vanquished during the War of Magic.

Abruptly, Xander’s life is changed forever. Now he must seek out an ancient artifact of legendary power in the hopes that it can stop the Fallen hordes from destroying the entire kingdom. Little does he realize that the hope of all mankind rests on his young shoulders, as powers of unimaginable might set out to stop him at all costs.

Aided by his friend Genica, a mysterious thief named Vreen, and a crafty Sion of unknown loyalty, Xander journeys into the heart of the world, where long-hidden secrets will be revealed that could shatter the delicate balance established by the great Cataclysm a thousand years earlier.

The Evolutionary Void by Peter F. Hamilton

Promo copy:

An innovator praised as one of the inventors of “the new space opera,” Peter F. Hamilton has also been hailed as the heir of such golden-age giants as Heinlein and Asimov. His star-spanning sagas are distinguished by deft plotting, engaging characters, provocative explorations of science and society, and soaring imaginative reach. Now, in one of the most eagerly anticipated offerings of the year, Hamilton brings his acclaimed Void trilogy to a stunning close.
Exposed as the Second Dreamer, Araminta has become the target of a galaxywide search by government agent Paula Myo and the psychopath known as the Cat, along with others equally determined to prevent—or facilitate—the pilgrimage of the Living Dream cult into the heart of the Void. An indestructible microuniverse, the Void may contain paradise, as the cultists believe, but it is also a deadly threat. For the miraculous reality that exists inside its boundaries demands energy—energy drawn from everything outside those boundaries: from planets, stars, galaxies . . . from everything that lives.

Meanwhile, the parallel story of Edeard, the Waterwalker—as told through a series of addictive dreams communicated to the gaiasphere via Inigo, the First Dreamer—continues to unfold. But now the inspirational tale of this idealistic young man takes a darker and more troubling turn as he finds himself faced with powerful new enemies—and temptations more powerful still.

With time running out, a repentant Inigo must decide whether to release Edeard’s final dream: a dream whose message is scarcely less dangerous than the pilgrimage promises to be. And Araminta must choose whether to run from her unwanted responsibilities or face them down, with no guarantee of success or survival. But all these choices may be for naught if the monomaniacal Ilanthe, leader of the breakaway Accelerator Faction, is able to enter the Void. For it is not paradise she seeks there, but dominion.

More in Part I

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

All Clear by Connie Willis

Promo copy:

In Blackout, award-winning author Connie Willis returned to the time-traveling future of 2060—the setting for several of her most celebrated works—and sent three Oxford historians to World War II England: Michael Davies, intent on observing heroism during the Miracle of Dunkirk; Merope Ward, studying children evacuated from London; and Polly Churchill, posing as a shopgirl in the middle of the Blitz. But when the three become unexpectedly trapped in 1940, they struggle not only to find their way home but to survive as Hitler’s bombers attempt to pummel London into submission.

Now the situation has grown even more dire. Small discrepancies in the historical record seem to indicate that one or all of them have somehow affected the past, changing the outcome of the war. The belief that the past can be observed but never altered has always been a core belief of time-travel theory—but suddenly it seems that the theory is horribly, tragically wrong.

Meanwhile, in 2060 Oxford, the historians’ supervisor, Mr. Dunworthy, and seventeen-year-old Colin Templer, who nurses a powerful crush on Polly, are engaged in a frantic and seemingly impossible struggle of their own—to find three missing needles in the haystack of history.

Told with compassion, humor, and an artistry both uplifting and devastating, All Clear is more than just the triumphant culmination of the adventure that began with Blackout. It’s Connie Willis’s most humane, heartfelt novel yet—a clear-eyed celebration of faith, love, and the quiet, ordinary acts of heroism and sacrifice too often overlooked by history.

RevSF Books Editor had this to say about Blackout and All Clear:

City Island

Promo copy:

Vince Rizzo (Andy Garcia) is a lifelong resident of the tiny, tradition-steeped Bronx enclave of City Island. A family man who makes his living as a corrections officer, Vince longs to become an actor. Ashamed to admit his aspirations to his family, Vince would rather let his fiery wife Joyce (Julianna Margulies) believe his weekly poker games are a cover for an extramarital affair than admit he’s secretly taking acting classes in Manhattan. When Vince is asked to reveal his biggest secret in class, he inadvertently sets off a chaotic chain of events that turns his mundane suburban life upside down. Winner of the Audience Award at the 2009 Tribeca Film Festival, City Island spins a web of misrepresentations, misinterpretations and misunderstandings into a smart and charming comedy about a family that stops at nothing to avoid the truth.

The Ragged Man (Book Four of the Twilight Reign) by Tom Lloyd

Promo copy:

Continuing the powerful epic that started with The Stormcaller; the Lord Isak is dead, his armies and entire tribe in disarray. It falls to King Emin to continue the war alone, and the Menin are only too happy to meet his challenge. In Byora, Ruhen is developing his ‘Saviour’ persona. The Harlequins start preaching in his name and many of the pilgrims who flock to him are recruited to be ‘Children’, disciples who spread Ruhen’s message. All over the Land people are starting to see Ruhen as the answer to their troubles. A showdown is coming: battle lines are finally drawn and the atrocities quickly mount. The spectre of the Great War looms, but in this age the Gods cannot and will not come to King Emin’s aid. With the peoples of the Land turning against Emin and his few remaining allies, their only chance for survival lies in the hands of a dead man.

More in Part II