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

Fantastic Texas by Lou Antonelli

Promo copy:

From ancient nuclear wars, to the secret of sexual attraction, with stops along the way for Bigfoot, ancient demons, and the truth behind alchemy, the stories in this book will take you on a truly fantastic journey through versions of Texas that were, could never be, and might have been. Steam played a big part in the first rocket launch from Texas, which was about a century earlier than we thought ("A Rocket for the Republic"). An unexpected experiment still running in the abandoned Superconducting Supercollider will introduce you to "The Witch of Waxahachie". And where would you go if global warming forced you out of Dallas? Maybe "Rome, If You Want To"? After that, ask yourself if a flying saucer is worth a silver dollar ("The Silver Dollar Saucer"). The possibilities are limitless in Lou Antonelli’s new collection, Fantastic Texas. Born in Massachusetts, Antonelli is a newspaper editor and up-and-coming author of speculative fiction.

Antonelli’s another one of those wonderfully bizarre gonzo-Texas writers. I swear, something must be in the water.

Carnal Sin by Allison Brennan

Shades of Gray (Icarus Project, Book 2) by Jackie Kessler and Caitlin Kittredge

Promo copy:

AFTER THE FALL OF NIGHT

Jet and Iridium—best friends turned bitter enemies—teamed up to foil the evil plans of the rogue superhero known as Night, but in defeating him they inadvertently destroyed the secret Corp-Co transmitter whose frequency kept the metapowered heroes of the Squadron in line. Now these heroes have turned against New Chicago, ransacking the city they once protected.

Even worse, the powerful antisuperhero group known as Everyman has taken advantage of the chaos to fan the flames of prejudice against all superpowered men and women. Just when New Chicago needs them most, Jet and the small band of heroes who have remained on the right side of the law find themselves the targets of suspicion and outright hatred.

Things aren’t going much better for Iridium. When she springs her father, a notorious supervillain, from prison to help her fight the marauding ex-superheroes, she finds that Corp-Co still has some nasty tricks up its sleeve.

But when the most dangerous man alive, the sociopath known as Doctor Hypnotic, suddenly surfaces, Jet and Iridium will once again be called upon to set aside their differences. Yet in the process, deeply buried secrets will come to light that will change everything the former best friends think they know about each other and themselves.

Twelve by Jasper Kent

Promo copy:

Melding the supernatural and the historical, a thrilling novel of vampires set in the Napoleonic wars.

In June 1812, Napoleon’s massive grande armée began its invasion of Russia, and the imperial Russian army, massively outnumbered and out maneuvered, was forced to retreat. But a handful of Russian officers — veterans of Borodino — are charged with trying to slow the enemy’s inexorable march on Moscow. Helping them is a band of mercenaries from the outermost fringes of Christian Europe, known as the Oprichniki — twelve in number — who arrive amidst rumours of plague travelling west from the Black Sea. Preferring to work alone, and at night, the twelve prove brutally, shockingly, effective against the French.

But one amongst the Russians, Aleksei Ivanovich Danilov, is unnerved by the Oprichniki’s ruthlessness. As he comes to understand the horrific nature of these strangers, he wonders at the nightmare they’ve unleashed in their midst.

Part I

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

Kraken by China Miéville

Promo copy:

With this outrageous new novel, China Miéville has written one of the strangest, funniest, and flat-out scariest books you will read this—or any other—year. The London that comes to life in Kraken is a weird metropolis awash in secret currents of myth and magic, where criminals, police, cultists, and wizards are locked in a war to bring about—or prevent—the End of All Things.

In the Darwin Centre at London’s Natural History Museum, Billy Harrow, a cephalopod specialist, is conducting a tour whose climax is meant to be the Centre’s prize specimen of a rare Architeuthis dux—better known as the Giant Squid. But Billy’s tour takes an unexpected turn when the squid suddenly and impossibly vanishes into thin air.

As Billy soon discovers, this is the precipitating act in a struggle to the death between mysterious but powerful forces in a London whose existence he has been blissfully ignorant of until now, a city whose denizens—human and otherwise—are adept in magic and murder.

There is the Congregation of God Kraken, a sect of squid worshippers whose roots go back to the dawn of humanity—and beyond. There is the criminal mastermind known as the Tattoo, a merciless maniac inked onto the flesh of a hapless victim. There is the FSRC—the Fundamentalist and Sect-Related Crime Unit—a branch of London’s finest that fights sorcery

with sorcery. There is Wati, a spirit from ancient Egypt who leads a ragtag union of magical familiars. There are the Londonmancers, who read the future in the city’s entrails. There is Grisamentum, London’s greatest wizard, whose shadow lingers long after his death. And then there is Goss and Subby, an ageless old man and a cretinous boy who, together, constitute a terrifying—yet darkly charismatic—demonic duo.

All of them—and others—are in pursuit of Billy, who inadvertently holds the key to the missing squid, an embryonic god whose powers, properly harnessed, can destroy all that is, was, and ever shall be.

Transformers: Exodus: The Official History of the War for Cybertron by Alex Irvine

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For twenty-five years the colossal battle between Megatron and Optimus Prime has captivated Transformers fans around the world. Yet the full story of the conflict between the two most famous Transformers—everything that happened before Optimus and Megatron arrived on planet Earth—has always been a mystery . . . until now. Here, for the first time told in its entirety, is the thrilling saga of Optimus and Megatron before they were enemies, before they even knew each other.

“Freedom is every Cybertronian’s right!” After Megatron utters these immortal words, the caste-bound planet of Cybertron is rocked to its foundations. Megatron, an undefeated gladiator thug, gives voice to the unspoken longings of the oppressed masses—and opens the mind of an insignificant data clerk to possibilities previously unthinkable.
Long before becoming the honorable Optimus Prime, Orion Pax is a mere office underling, an unlikely candidate to answer an outlaw’s call to revolution. But Orion is determined to meet this defiant enemy of all that Cybertron stands for, no matter what he has to do, or how many laws he has to break.

What happens between Orion Pax and Megatron forever changes the destiny of all Transformers. This gripping, action-packed novel reveals all the loyalties and treacheries, trust and betrayals, deadly violence and shining ideals, as well as the pivotal roles played by other characters, including Starscream, Sentinel Prime, Omega Supreme, and one of the thirteen original Primes, the last link to Cybertron’s glorious Golden Age.

Discover how meek disciple Orion Pax becomes the fearless leader Optimus Prime; follow the tantalizing clues about the lost Matrix of Leadership and the lore surrounding it; find out why the two allies fighting a corrupt regime suddenly turn on each other, and what triggers their epic war. Transformers: Exodus provides everything fans ever wanted to know about one of the fiercest rivalries of all time.

Flinx Transcendent by Alan Dean Foster

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Flinx is the only one with any chance of stopping the evil colossus barreling in to destroy the Humanx Commonwealth (and everything else in the Milky Way). His efforts take him to the land of his mortal enemies, the bloodthirsty AAnn, where chances are excellent that Flinx may be executed. And he must also seek out an ancient sentient weapons platform wandering around the galaxy and then communicate with it, a powwow that could very well fry his brain. Then there are the oblivion-craving assassins determined to stop Flinx before he can prevent total annihilation. With a future that rosy, it’s no surprise that Flinx is flirting with disaster. Still, he’s no quitter. Now he’s going to need every ounce of his know-how, because he’s venturing to places where no one’s ever been, to do what no one’s ever done, and where his deadliest enemy is so close it’s invisible.

The War That Came Early: Hitler’s War by Harry Turtledove

A stroke of the pen and history is changed. In 1938, British prime minister Neville Chamberlain, determined to avoid war, signed the Munich Accord, ceding part of Czechoslovakia to Hitler. But the following spring, Hitler snatched the rest of that country, and England, after a fatal act of appeasement, was fighting a war for which it was not prepared. Now, in this thrilling alternate history, another scenario is played out: What if Chamberlain had not signed the accord?

In this action-packed chronicle of the war that might have been, Harry Turtledove uses dozens of points of view to tell the story: from American marines serving in Japanese-occupied China and ragtag volunteers fighting in the Abraham Lincoln Battalion in Spain to an American woman desperately trying to escape Nazi-occupied territory—and witnessing the war from within the belly of the beast. A tale of powerful leaders and ordinary people, at once brilliantly imaginative and hugely entertaining, Hitler’s War captures the beginning of a very different World War II—with a very different fate for our world today.

For Moving Pictures, I reviewed Get Him to the Greek.

Over at Moving Pictures, I eviscerate Vincenzo Natali’s Splice.

Yes, it is that bad.

Today I got the ThinkGeek catalog in the mail. An actual PHYSICAL catalog via SNAIL mail.

ThinkGeek offers a plethora geeky goodness. For example, the legendary Tauntaun Sleeping Bag on p. 10.

How about the Doctor Who Tardis 4 Port USB Hub on p.19?

Love the blinking blue light!

Or what I like to call the Mark Finn Special: Tac Bac-Tactical Canned Bacon on p. 23.

And my personal favorite: Bolt Interactive Laser Pet Toy on p. 13. Anything that distracts the hellcat, Kali, is a-okay in my book!

I never signed up for the catalog but I can definitely see why I was sent one. My conundrum lied in why in this digital age, a geek-oriented seller would even bother to print a catalog. But it all became clear once I visited the site.

Now bathroom reading is something I can get behind! Heck, that’s where I read this entire catalog.

A plethora of geek stuff will begin streaming via Netflix in June.

Premiering June 1:

Bram Stoker’s Dracula’s Guest
Godzilla: Animated Series Volumes 1-3
Godzilla: King of the Monsters
Godzilla vs. Mothra (1964)
Harvie Krumpet
The Haunted World of El Superbeasto
The House of the Devil
The Kids in the Hall: The Pilot Episode
Philosophy of a Knife: Limited Edition
Popeye & Friends
Reefer Madness
The Stranger
Suspiria
Urban Gothic: Season 1
Visions of Suffering

Premiering June 4:

The Avengers
Die Hard 2: Die Harder
James and the Giant Peach
Mad Max
The Mask
Second Jungle Book: Mowgli and Baloo
Walled In

Premiering June 8:

The Pluto Files: Nova

Premiering June 11:

Bicentennial Man
Sarah Silverman Program

Premiering June 15:

Epidemic
Jack and the Beanstalk
Mary and Max
Ong Bak 2: The Beginning
Psycho Ward
Unearthed

Premiering June 22:

Bluebeard
MST3K: The Corpse Vanishes
MST3K: Final Justice
MST3K: Mad Monster
MST3K: Manhunt in Space
MST3K: Night of the Blood Beast
MST3K: Soultaker
MST3K: Warrior of the Lost World
Mystery Science Theater 3000: Santa Claus
Riverworld (2010)
Shattered Lives
TiMER
Uncle Sam Magoo
Wolf Moon

Premiering June 25:

Cowboy Bebop: The Movie
Jaws
Jaws 2
Jaws 3

Premiering June 26:

Contact
Surrogates

Info is courtesy of FeedFliks.

As I’m sure y’all have heard by now, Guillermo del Toro has stepped down as The Hobbit director. While this causes lots of teeth gnashing within the geek community, I see this as a good… no… GREAT thing.

del Toro is not always at his best in other people’s playgrounds. The worst film he directed, Blade II practically destroyed the burgeoning franchise. The mediocre Hellboy and the nearly unwatchable Hellboy II: The Golden Army feel like something to pay the bills between his own projects.

Scene from Hellboy II: The Golden Army

His skills as both director and writer really shine in movies that he develops whole cloth. His first full length picture the creepy Cronos offered a unique take on the vampire myth. While his first large budget film, Mimic may not be fantastic, it’s still more memorable than Blade II and both Hellboys.

Scene from Cronos

del Toro’s third film introduced the first of his planned Spanish Civil War trilogy and effectively showcased his unique talents. Set in an orphanage during the Spanish Civil War, the terrifying Devil’s Backbone (El espinazo del diablo) moved del Toro from a director to keep an eye on to a must-see filmmaker.

For the second installment, del Toro outdid himself. Creating an exquisite fairy tale for adults, Pan’s Labyrinth (El laberinto del fauno) propelled del Toro into the upper echelons of genre directors.

Scene from Pan’s Labyrinth

So with all this evidence, I was confused as to why people were so excited about him filming The Hobbit. Clearly, del Toro excels when working on his own creations. Personally, I welcome the third Spanish Civil War film than another adaptation.

So Guillermo, if you are reading, I’m sorry you lost the big gig (and more importantly two years of work), but I am very excited about the prospect of an original movie from you. You are among the field’s best and brightest. Let’s see some more of the stuff rattling around in your head. I’ll be among the first in line to experience it!

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

Wednesday Comics

Promo copy:

This oversized hardcover edition collects the entire critically acclaimed anthology series that reinvented the classic weekly newspaper comics section. It features 16-different stories starring the World’s Greatest Super Heroes including Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern and the Flash, as well as lesser known characters including Metamorpho and Metal Men written and Illustrated by the comic industry’s top talents including including Neil Gaiman (THE SANDMAN), Brian Azzarello and Lee Bermejo (JOKER), Dave Gibbons (WATCHMEN) Eduardo Risso (100 BULLETS), Joe Kubert (SGT. ROCK) and Paul Pope (BATMAN: YEAR ONE HUNDRED). The 11" x 17" trim size best approximates the oversized reading experience from the weekly periodical which was spearheaded by DCU Editorial Art Director Mark Chiarello, whose past editing credits include BATMAN BLACK and WHITE, DC: THE NEW FRONTIER. The full list of featured stories and creators is as follows:

BATMAN, by the Eisner Award-winning 100 BULLETS team of writer Brian Azzarello and artist Eduardo Risso

ADAM STRANGE, by writer/artist Paul Pope (BATMAN: YEAR 100) METAMORPHO, written by New York Times best-selling writer Neil Gaiman with Art by Eisner Award-winner Michael Allred (Madman)

THE DEMON AND CATWOMAN, written by Walter Simonson (Thor, MANHUNTER) with Art by famed DC cover artist Brian Stelfreeze

DEADMAN, written by Dave Bullock and Vinton Heuck, Art by Dave Bullock

KAMANDI, written by Dave Gibbons (WATCHMEN, GREEN LANTERN CORPS) with Art by Ryan Sook (Buffy The Vampire Slayer, ARKHAM ASYLUM: LIVING HELL)

SUPERMAN, written by John Arcudi (The Mask) with Art by Lee Bermejo (JOKER)

WONDER WOMAN, written and illustrated by Ben Caldwell (Dare Detectives)

GREEN LANTERN, written by Kurt Busiek (TRINITY, ASTRO CITY) with Art by Joe Quiñones (TEEN TITANS GO!)

TEEN TITANS, written by Eddie Berganza with Art by Sean Galloway

SUPERGIRL, written by Jimmy Palmiotti (JONAH HEX) with Art by Amanda Conner (POWER GIRL)

HAWKMAN, written and illustrated by Kyle Baker (PLASTIC MAN, Special Forces)

SGT. ROCK, written by Adam Kubert (SUPERMAN: LAST SON), ilustrated by legendary comics artist Joe Kubert

THE FLASH, written by Karl Kerschl (TEEN TITANS YEAR ONE, THE FLASH: THE FASTEST MAN ALIVE) and Brenden Fletcher, illustrated by Karl Kerschl

METAL MEN, written by Dan DiDio with Art by Ian Churchill (SUPERGIRL)

Acts of Violence: An Anthology of Crime Comics

Promo copy:

ACTS OF VIOLENCE is a collection of short stories in the pulp tradition. It doesn’t shy away from bullets or bloodshed. It tackles characters with flawed judgment and loose morals. The storylines are ripped from the filthy underbelly of the world in which we live. ACTS OF VIOLENCE peers into the shadows and shines a light on what scuttles on the periphery.

In THE THREE PRINCES, a trio of young friends is schooled on the alcohol and blood soaked streets of Prohibition era America.

A rookie lawman must protect a killer from the desperate and despairing parents of a murdered girl in SIX O’CLOCK NOOSE.

A drug addled ten-time loser seeks to break the chains of misery that bind him in REGGIE-TOWN.

And in THE ORCHARD, two cops take a late night drive into broken morals and violence.

Featuring the talents of Toren Atkinson, Ed Brisson, Chad Boudreau, Dino Caruso, Damian Couceiro, Todd Ireland, Kevin Leeson, Manoel Magalhaes, and Marvin Mann and cover art by Fiona Staples, ACTS OF VIOLENCE unveils a roster of new voices in hard-boiled crime comics.

Goats: Showcase Showdown by Jonathan Rosenberg

Promo copy:

Book Three of The Infinite Pendergast Cycle

God is dead, reality isn’t real, and the end of the multiverse is coming just a few short years from now. Most everyone is in agreement that this is problematic. Tech-geek barflies Jon and Phillip and their menagerie of mutant sidekicks are the only ones who can challenge the likes of goat demon Toothgnip, corporate demon One Death, and psycho chicken Oliver in order to stop the apocalypse. Which means everyone everywhere is almost certainly screwed. Goats: Showcase Showdown—the third collection of strips from the hit webcomic—continues the pandimensional party.

A God Somewhere Written by John Arcudi Art by Peter Snejbjerg

Promo copy:

After a mysterious disaster, a young man named Eric finds that he has just as mysteriously developed extraordinary abilities. He starts out trying to help people, but his solitary position in the world isolates him in ways no ordinary human could understand. This original graphic novel written by John Arcudi (B.P.R.D., WEDNESDAY COMICS) charts the arc of Eric’s evolution from man to…something else, as seen through the eyes of his family and his best friend, Sam.

The Amazon Written by Steven T. Seagle Art by Tim Sale

Promo copy:

One of the earliest projects from acclaimed writer Steven T. Seagle and superstar artist Tim Sale returns in a gorgeous hardcover edition! The Amazon jungle is among the most ancient and biologically diverse places on earth, but it’s being plundered for its resources and destroyed at a rate of thousands of acres a day. Reporter Malcolm Hilliard travels to this remote land of mystery to investigate the disappearance of an American worker and the subsequent sabotage of a timber company. Once there, Malcolm learns about the local cultures and myths, experiences the dark underside of industrial progress, gets drugged and left to fend for himself in the jungle, and is confronted by the Spirit of the Amazon itself in Seagle and Sale’s South American Heart of Darkness.

I reviewed Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time for Moving Pictures.

Be sure to check out the rest of my review.

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

The Third Bear by Jeff VanderMeer

Promo copy:

The award-winning short fictions in this collection highlight the voice of an inventive contemporary fantasist who has been compared by critics to Borges, Nabokov, and Kafka. In addition to highlights such as “The Situation,” in which a beleaguered office worker creates a child-swallowing manta ray to be used for educational purposes and “Errata,” which follows an oddly familiar writer who has marshaled a penguin, a shaman, and two pearl-handled pistols with which to plot the end of the world, this volume contains two never-before-published stories. Chimerical and hypnotic, this compilation leads readers through the postmodern into what is emerging into a new literature of the imagination.

One of the leading fantasists of this generation, Jeff VanderMeer’s new collection is a must have for any discerning reader.

The Stranger

Promo copy:

Steve Austin stars as a man with no name, no memory and absolutely nothing left to lose. When he finds himself hunted by both the FBI and the Russian mob, he decides to fight back. And with every beating, bullet and betrayal, he ll remember another piece of the horror that took away his career, his family and his identity. Now the puzzle is nearly complete, and one man is about to take back his past…by ending a whole lot of futures. Erica Cerra and Adam Beach star in this explosive action-thriller about collateral damage, stone cold vengeance, and a double-crossed killing machine known only as THE STRANGER.

Yes, that is pro wrestler Steve Austin. Complete with hologram cover! Really.

The Passage by Justin Cronin

Promo copy:

“It happened fast. Thirty-two minutes for one world to die, another to be born.”

First, the unthinkable: a security breach at a secret U.S. government facility unleashes the monstrous product of a chilling military experiment. Then, the unspeakable: a night of chaos and carnage gives way to sunrise on a nation, and ultimately a world, forever altered. All that remains for the stunned survivors is the long fight ahead and a future ruled by fear—of darkness, of death, of a fate far worse.

As civilization swiftly crumbles into a primal landscape of predators and prey, two people flee in search of sanctuary. FBI agent Brad Wolgast is a good man haunted by what he’s done in the line of duty. Six-year-old orphan Amy Harper Bellafonte is a refugee from the doomed scientific project that has triggered apocalypse. He is determined to protect her from the horror set loose by her captors. But for Amy, escaping the bloody fallout is only the beginning of a much longer odyssey—spanning miles and decades—towards the time and place where she must finish what should never have begun.

With The Passage, award-winning author Justin Cronin has written both a relentlessly suspenseful adventure and an epic chronicle of human endurance in the face of unprecedented catastrophe and unimaginable danger. Its inventive storytelling, masterful prose, and depth of human insight mark it as a crucial and transcendent work of modern fiction.

More in Part II