Monday, August 31, 2015

Memories are Made of This; I, the Jury

I've been on a Rat Pack kick lately, rewatching the old films (the original "Ocean's 11" is so brilliant. So, so brilliant) and listening to my Frank Sinatra albums. I've already read a lot about Mr. Sinatra, so I thought I should learn more about Dean Martin, and read his daughter Deana's memoir. It was very loving, and she definitely wanted him to come across as a good guy, but jeez, he did some very terrible things to his kids. Deana makes excuses for him, since he was so incredibly busy and successful, his time was very precious and valuable, but come on. Don't have seven kids if you don't want to devote the time and energy into raising them. She tells a story of how she was so excited to have her Dad agree to go out to dinner with her and her husband on her birthday, only to have her dad's manager call a few days beforehand and cancel. Deana was so upset, in tears, and her husband called Dean's private line and basically told him to be a man and cancel himself, not get his lackey to do it. Dean protested ignorance, claiming the man must have gotten it wrong, he had no intention of canceling on Deana, and he did end up going out to dinner with them--but then he changed his private number and whenever Deana wanted to talk to her own father she had to go through his service. Very disappointing to hear.

Years ago, I bought (and read) volumes one and two of the Mickey Spillane collection. I hadn't read them in a very long time and was in the mood for something dark and gritty, so I reread "I, the Jury". I'd forgotten how good it was. Mike is angry when a good friend of his is brutally murdered and vows revenge. As he starts digging, he starts unraveling a complex syndicate of pimps and drug dealers operating in creative ways. More and more bodies pile up until Mike is finally able to get his revenge.

Monday, August 24, 2015

Voices in the Night; White Out; Losing the Signal

I know I keep saying that I'm not a big fan of short stories, but I did like Steven Millhauser's previous collection, "We Others", and I enjoyed his latest as well. There seemed to be a lot of stories about things going wrong in small towns, but there was a really good one about a son going to visit his mother, whom he hadn't seen in a long time. They were all pretty good.






"White Out" by Michael W. Clune is a memoir about his heroin addiction. It was interesting, although I would have preferred more details, like how exactly it started. I suppose sometimes it's hard to say, he seemed to be a normal middle class college student who just started doing heroin and got hooked. I'm glad he made it out of his addiction spiral and seems to be doing fine now, I know how hard it is for drug addicts, especially heroin users, to break that cycle. Evil stuff.





I loved my BlackBerry. I got my Storm 2 in October of 2009, the day it came out, and I was so excited, other than the LG Chocolate I had previously I'd never been excited for a phone before or since. I had that phone for almost 5 years, finally replacing it with an Android in 2014. It still worked pretty well, and I was sad to part with it, but what killed BlackBerry for me was the lack of apps. I was even willing to overlook the 3 days in 2011 when their servers went down and I lost my crackberry for the first time and I realized how addicted I was to the damn thing. "Losing the Signal" was a great story about the meteoric rise of an underdog little Canadian company, Research in Motion (RIM). How one tiny misstep led to their complete downfall. It was heartbreaking, truly. I'd love for BB to make a comeback and provide some much needed competition in the smartphone market. I don't like only having two different types to choose from, honestly (I don't count Windows phones, since they have such a small market share). I definitely don't want a phone like everyone else in the world has, either, which is why I won't own an iPhone. I'm afraid BB's time has come and gone.

Saturday, August 22, 2015

Speaking in Bones; Fables Vol. 21; The Familiar Vol. 1

The latest Temperance Brennan book by Kathy Reichs was really good. Tempe is contacted by a woman who is a cybersleuth, trying to help find missing persons using online tools. She believes some unidentified remains that Tempe found belong to a young girl whose family claims she isn't even missing. No one has seen the girl in years, but the family says she ran off with some boy and they aren't concerned about her. Tempe is reluctant to dig in at first, but once she does she finds that nothing is as it actually seems. I enjoyed it, plus, bonus, it looks like Tempe and Detective Ryan are moving in together! Not quite marriage, but I'll take it :)



"Fables: Vol. 21" by Bill Willingham was pretty good, too. It seems like he might be gearing up to end the run, he's wrapping up loose ends. Rose Red discovers that the former Mrs. Spratt has been controlling Bigby through her glass ring and takes it from her. She also discovers that she and Snow are locked in a battle they cannot escape: due to a longtime family curse, only one daughter can inherit the power, so they cannot both survive. One has to kill the other. It looks like Rose is going to try to use Bigby to kill his wife. Oh boy...




There is no way I could succinctly summarize Mark Z. Danielewski's latest. I can't even begin to try. It was fascinating, though, and very good, extremely readable, despite its brick like appearance. The book takes place over the course of one rainy day in May, following a group of people from all over the world, although mostly in L.A. At the heart of the book is a young girl named Xanther, who is going with her stepdad to pick up a highly trained dog that should help her with her epilepsy. I'm excited for the next volume, to see how all these seemingly random people's stories tie together.  

Saturday, August 8, 2015

Go Set a Watchman; The Cartel

Like most people, I was quite excited when I first heard that Harper Lee had finally consented to have another one of her books published. After reading so much about her over the years, and her adamant assertions that she would publish nothing else while living, I assumed I would have to wait for the sad day of her death. But then the details of *how* this book came to be emerged, and I got an icky feeling about not only the content but about Ms. Lee being taken advantage of. Nevertheless, I wanted to read it, because I did enjoy "Mockingbird" so much.
The first two-thirds or so were good. I can see why her publisher wanted her to write a different book from Scout's point of view: the best parts are the childhood flashbacks. Her humor is dead on sharp and her Southern sarcasm is so thick as to smother you, which I enjoyed. But then the last third of the book became a lecture on race relations in the South, and when I finished the book I realized there was no story. No plot. Nothing happened. It just was. I really hope this doesn't destroy people's love of "To Kill a Mockingbird", and make them think less of Harper Lee as a writer. Clearly if she was in her full capacity this book wouldn't have seen the light of day. If you read it for what it is, a draft, unfinished, unpolished, then it's okay, but if you're expecting greatness, you'll be disappointed.

I loved "The Cartel" by Don Winslow. Wow, what a ride. It takes place over about a decade and dives into the drug wars in North America. Keller is determined to get Adan Berrera, and the drug kingpin is imprisoned, but allowed to escape by a corrupt government and Keller spends the next ten years or so trying to hunt and bring him down. Winslow does an excellent job of highlighting the pointless, ugly brutality of drug violence and the utter hopelessness and pointlessness of trying to fight these insanely wealthy and well connected criminals. It was so good.