First up: James Ellroy's "Hilliker Curse", his autobiography of why and how his relationships with women are so screwed up. We all know Ellroy is one very messed up individual (have I mentioned how much I loved his "My Dark Places"?) and this really confirms it. He blames himself for his mother's murder when he was just 10 years old, he's never gotten over it, and it's permanently messed up any interactions he has with the opposite sex. Fascinating but very, very sad.
"Fables: the Great Fables Crossover" by Bill Willingham was very funny. Jack of Fables (different series I haven't gotten to yet--but I will) and our well known Fable friends are out to stop Peter Thorn from rewriting history and wiping their universe out of existence.
"Fables: 1001 Nights of Snowfall" by Bill Willingham is a take on "Arabian Nights". Snow White is being held captive by an Arab sultan who plans to execute her in the morning. She entertains him with stories of many of the Fables's beginnings, and he delays her execution to hear her tales. It was great to get the back story on some of my favorite Fables characters!
The return of football means the return of football books! "The Ones Who Hit the Hardest" by Chad Millman and Shawn Coyne tells the story of the pride the town of Pittsburgh had (and continues to have) for their Steelers. The 1970s were a terrible time to be a blue collar worker in America, even moreso in Pittsburgh. It was a great story but the pace kept getting slowed down by the insertion of tidbits about the steelworkers union. It would have been better to leave that out.
"Dexter is Delicious" is Jeffrey Lindsay's latest Dexter (can't wait for the premier of the show next Sunday!!). I love the dark, snarky humor in Lindsay's books. Dex is now a daddy, to little Lily Anne, and his brother Brian makes a surprise return (obviously the books and TV show don't match up). Since Dexter has now sworn off the dark ways Brian steps in to instruct Cody and Astor, which doesn't please Dex one bit. He and Deb are after a tribe of cannibals and he is kidnapped by them and nearly eaten not once but twice. In the end, of course, Dexter returns to his deliciously wicked ways. For sister Deb, of course.
A wonderful biography of Queen Mary, Anna Whitelock's "Mary: Princess, Bastard, Queen" sets out to set the record straight and clear up some of the awful misconceptions about Mary's reign. She is of course overshadowed in history by her brilliant younger half-sister, Queen Elizabeth I, and rightly so, but Mary was brave and courageous in her own right and her own contributions should not be overlooked. Whitelock does conveniently try to gloss over the worst of Mary's actions, like the terrible burning deaths of people who dared question the Catholic faith, but all in all she does a beautiful job of showing how Mary Tudor really was her mother's daughter.
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