I had heard of these graphic novels before, most recently in reference to a bonus story called “The Engima of Amigara Fault,” so I finally sat down and read them the other night. The two books tell an unsettling saga of walking sea creatures coming up onto land, causing chaos and raising many questions. Where did their shiny, strange legs come from? What do they want? And what on earth is going to happen next? The mystery becomes much more complex than anyone could have imagined, and has sinister overtones for the future of humanity. I would definitely recommend this tale to fans of horror!
Tag Archives: books
#7-#8. Gyo Vol. I & II by Junji Ito
Filed under Uncategorized
#6. Blockade Billy by Stephen King
The title tale is a relatively short story, a sports story with a horrible, dark secret. Joe and I found this book as a present for my dad, a longtime King fan and fellow baseball enthusiast. He read it quickly and tossed it to me, commanding me to read the second short story in the brief book, “Morality.” It really stuck with him, that second story.
“Blockade Billy” is good; a quick story that builds and builds, but it does not really feel like a “King” story. This was my dad’s take on it, being much better read in his works than me, and after thinking on it a bit and comparing it to “Morality” I would have to agree. A strange small-time Iowa catcher fills in for an injured Major League player, Faraday of the long-forgotten New Jersey Titans…forgotten because of the catcher, and what happens during his brief time in the pros. It has an old-timey sports radio feel to it: “Top of the ninth and The Doo’s looking at the top of the lineup. Strikes out Malzone…strikes out Klaus…Then comes Williams, old Teddy Ballgame. The Doo gets him on the hip, oh and two, then weakens and walks him” (21). It’s heavy on baseball and low on suspense, but the ending does pack something of a wallop.
“Morality” feels like a micro-study in bad impulses. The premise is much more King’s signature: a down-on-their-luck couple is offered $200,000 to commit a sin by proxy for an elderly minister’s amusement. The story draws the offer out, then escalates quickly, ending with little fanfare, making it all the more appropriate and unsettling.
Overall, a good little summer read. I read most of this at work the other day while running the community softball league concession stand. Somehow the legend of Blockade Billy rings a little truer listening to bats crack as you shell sunflower seeds with your teeth.
Filed under Uncategorized
#5. Every Girl is the End of the World for Me by Jeffrey Brown
I love Jeffrey Brown’s comics. This is one of his many autobiographical stories, a short tale of ~3 weeks one winter when he was obsessed with a number of female friends and former lovers. It’s a cute, brilliant snapshot.
I own a lot of his comics – Unlikely (my favorite, and the most heartbreaking), Clumsy, AEIOU, EGITEOTWFM, I Am Going To Be Small, Feeble Attempts, Incredible Change-Bots – but I have not gotten around to reading all of them! Perhaps I will tackle the rest before this year is done.
I am also currently working my way through the slightly denser fare contained within The Weird Tales of H.P. Lovecraft and (still) Wuthering Heights.
Filed under Uncategorized
#4. I Am My Mother’s Daughter by Iris Krasnow
I Am My Mother’s Daughter is a nonfiction piece about — you guessed it — mothers and daughters. There were many diverse interviews about all kinds of mother/daughter relationships, which I liked, but would have enjoyed more if I could have related to them on a personal level. For example, this probably would have spoken to me more strongly if I myself were a mother, as “mothers with mothers” was a prominent idea throughout the book. It would be great to find a book like this geared more for women my age, still on the precipice of adulthood and being your own person while still maintaining that weird, wonderful relationship with the one we call Mom.
Filed under Uncategorized
#3. A Practical Wedding by Meg Keene
I recently read Meg Keene’s stellar book on wedding planning, A Practical Wedding. It is less about which flowers to buy or what kind of cake to serve and much more about how you should feel about your wedding and the people in it. You should be joyful, honest, and very flexible with whatever happens when it all comes together. (And only DIY your brains out if you actually like crafts.) But until it all comes together…it’s kind of okay to feel like the whole ordeal is overwhelming and irritating. There are a lot of tips about making the day meaningful, being nice to your budget, and that no matter what happens, your marriage should be at the forefront of such a big event. As the titles states, it is a very practical book. The best bit of practical advice I gleaned was this: getting married may be one of the finest moments of your life, but there are a whole lot of other good days out there too.
I read it at a very good time in the planning process, and would highly recommend it to anyone throwing any kind of marriage celebration, from an intimate reception at a favorite restaurant to a full-blown catered garden wedding.
Meg runs a really neat website too!
Filed under Uncategorized
#2. Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi
The second book I chose for 2012 was Persepolis, a graphic novel by Marjane Satrapi about her life growing up in Iran during the Islamic Revolution.
I chose it for several reasons. I saw the movie with my revolutionarily-inclined friend V when we were in college. She recently tweeted about reading the book herself and I remembered that, yes, I owned this book, and yes, now is the time to read it!
(On a side note, 2007-2008, the time when all this took place, was a great time in my life. It is when we are the most confused about where we’re going and WHAT we are that I think we make the boldest decisions. I think it is definitely when we learn the most about ourselves, even in retrospect. “Why did we so fervently play tag in the dark? Oh yes, because none of us could bear to be apart.”)
I saw Ms. Satrapi speak at my school around the time her movie came out. She is a delightful speaker, so honest about her life and her work. I read this 300+ page history lesson in roughly three days. It is a personal story, recounting her childhood memories and young adult misadventures, as well as a national history of a place so few people outside of it understand. At times it feels like an educational program: page after page of intimate conversations about war or sex or unease, and suddenly a character is breaking the fourth wall to tell us what a word means in Persian or explain the moral motivation behind the burgeoning, repressive legal system…and then right back into the everyday life of a thoughtful Iranian woman. It is an excellent use of the comic form to convey important information without breaking the pace or mood of the story.
Whenever there is an international crisis, this book should be read. Crisis in the Middle East, crisis among our own people, crisis in Europe or South America or Asia or Africa or Australia. Although it is a book dedicated to recounting life through an Iranian perspective, it has the universal appeal of any government which goes through dynamic change. It has the universal appeal of confronting stereotypes, growing up and fitting in, finding your path in life, and reconciling the forever difficult line between tradition and modernity.
It is excellent. Go pick it up. She has written two other graphic novels since Persepolis, Embroideries and Chicken with Plums. I hope to add those to my 2012 list!
Filed under Uncategorized
#1. Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk
The first book of 2012 is Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk. It is a series of short stories all taking place within the locked confines of a Writers’ Retreat concocted by the old and mysterious Mr. Whittier.
Would you abandon your life for three months to create your masterpiece? Just one suitcase, a pre-dawn bus to Somewhere Else full of strangers, and three months of isolation. The stories are told by the writers, prisoners to this unique promise; stories to pass the time, ignore their restraints, and to declare themselves the true hero of the big, grand finale. “The Story of Us,” as they call it, the story of a group of people peppered with unusual personalities such as Lady Baglady, Mother Nature, and The Missing Link. The mythology that will make them famous and rip them to shreds.
I loved this book. I just really enjoy Chuck Palahniuk. (Rant, a story I voraciously audiobooked in the summer of 2010, is one of the most intricately told stories about childhood, home, time travel, and demolition derbies you will ever find. Do it ASAP.) He is quickly becoming my favorite author in the way he is able to sew stories without ever dropping a stitch. No name is a throwaway name, no questionable eccentricity is ever left unexplained by the last page.
There is tons of squicky business in all of his books, though this one probably takes the cake. Stories like “Guts” and “Hot Potting” make it hard to eat lunch afterward. All the poems that precede the short stories, they left me breathless. They are actually quite moving character studies amid a torrent of bloodshed and sexual depravity.
One of the most compelling elements of this book, besides the band of increasingly diabolical characters, is the atmosphere. Without going into much detail – discovering the beautifully molding, surreal setting of the book is a delightful revelation I would hate to deprive a would-be reader of – it is a place where it is easy to imagine everyone’s demons coming out to play. The oppression in the details of the mundane, of the abruptly bizarre, is like a character in and of itself.
I have only one issue with this book, though I suppose it is an aspect of the story which is somewhat open to interpretation. It is a narrative detail at the very end – if any of you have read Haunted, please let me know if you have had similar thoughts.
Filed under Uncategorized
Earl Grey and A Million Words 