Book 47: Home Truths by David Lodge, isbn 9780140291806, 115 pages, Penguin, $11.95
There's an oft-quoted / paraphrased theory of fiction writing that says "the form finds the story." I know Neil Gaiman has blogged about the concept: how occasionally he's struggled trying to tell a story in a certain way only to discover it works better as something else (trying to write a short story when what it really wants to be is a poem, for example). And of course Alan Moore is famous for his refusal to have anything to do with adaptations of his work into other forms of storytelling (see the movie versions of Watchmen, V For Vendetta, From Hell, League of Extraordinary Gentlemen) because he told the story in the style and format it fit best in, and it didn't need to be anything else.
I have occasionally toyed with turning both of my less-than-successful attempts at one-act plays into novellas. David Lodge's Home Truths made me think twice about it. Lodge's novella is a prose rendering of his play of the same title. His short note at the beginning tells you so, and also tells you that he put back in dialogue cut from various productions of the play. The problem is, the novella doesn't feel like a novella -- it feels like a playscript with very very explicit stage directions added in, and one odd veering-off into something that could not actually have been staged the way it's written (which, perhaps, was Lodge's whole intent for the piece, but since most of it sticks to what conceivably would have been an English Country Home One Room Drama, the piece that doesn't take place in that one room feels highly highly out of place.)
The plot, in short, is this: retired author Adrian Ludlow and his wife are visited by their old friend Sam Sharp, who is quite upset a scathing profile done by paparazzi-journalist Fanny Tarrant. A revenge scheme is set up, involving Adrian being interviewed by Tarrant at the same time that he interviews her. Will the retired author give up his own beloved privacy to skewer the woman who skewers famous people?
I have a feeling if I had seen Home Truths staged, I'd have enjoyed it quite a bit. The very British snappy patter speaks to me, and the topic is ... well, topical, perhaps even moreso now than when the play was written in 1998 (the action takes place around a pivotal cultural moment in 1997). But in book form, Lodge uses an awful lot of "he said" style dialogue tags that quickly get repetitive and actually annoying, cutting into the flow of the story. And in the end, the point Lodge seems to be trying to make is almost too cliche precisely because of that pivotal cultural moment Lodge relies on to make the point.
Reading this novella was instructional for me as a writer, but not something I'd recommend eagerly to others.
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
A Visit To Palimpsest
Book 46: Palimpsest by Catherynne M. Valente, isbn 9780553385762, 367 pages, Bantam, $14.00
Back in May, when I was reading the short story anthology Paper Cities, I read and reviewed Cat Valente's short story "Palimpsest." At the time, I didn't know that story was excerpted from her novel of the same name. It was the choice to make the novel her August book club selection by![[info]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_t-mMKzRtm5x4UCpb2ls-6EBhFzbkW00f0m1Cqh6wEIEBvwD9d4XFK51r-XaJfKjInQDPF6KZzrVF4CaFzMIAH3FzmkKEHxqDeUWgr1xfwZ-g=s0-d)
calico_reaction that clued me in to the world of Palimpsest existing in longer form. I enjoyed the short story, as you can see from my brief comments here. I also enjoyed the novel, although I had to work harder at it.
"I had to work harder at it" sounds awfully negative now that I read it on the screen. I considered rephrasing that sentence, but I'm not going to. It says what I want it to say: Palimpsest is not a mindless beach read. It's not trope-filling SF, the kind of thing you can sort of let your attention wander and still know what's going on. Palimpsest the novel requires your attention the way Palimpsest the city requires the devotion of its inhabitants and visitors. You can choose, like one minor character in the book, to walk away if the work is too weird for you. Honestly, I almost did walk away. As much as I've enjoyed Ms. Valente's short stories, I was on vacation and didn't want to tax my brain too hard. It was being introduced to that minor character who gives up on Palimpsest that made me decide to stick it out; I'm not one to normally give up on a book anyway (the list of books I couldn't bring myself to finish is a short list indeed), but something about a minor character wishing she'd never heard of the place the four major characters (and several other secondary ones) are willing to hurt themselves to move to made me decide to see the novel through and find out if either her sacrifice of the city or the major characters' sacrifices of parts of themselves (literally and figuratively) was the wiser, more noble choice.
I realize I have not summarized the book at all, or given you any indication of what it's about. An online friend commented that it's a book about "a sexually-transmitted city." That's the high concept: people can only find Palimpsest after they've had sex with someone who has been to Palimpsest, after which a portion of a map of the city becomes a permanent tattoo somewhere on their flesh. After that, they can only return to Palimpsest, as 'immigrants,' by having sex with other people who have been tattoed by the city. Many of the characters wonder what it takes to go from immigrant to emigre, and would gladly pay whatever price -- the city is that addictive for them.
A book can't survive on high concept alone. Well, okay, some books can and become wildly popular because they are nothing but high concept. This particular high concept wouldn't sustain itself, though, if it were just a series of orgiastic vignettes. Well, okay, again some books would, but I'd lose interest quickly. Each of the main characters needs something the city can provide, each of them is searching for something they've lost. Valente creates a main quartet of characters that is international, intergenerational, intergender and fluid intersexual -- a pretty good cross-section of society. They may start out as "types" (the disaffected Asian, the lonely young spinster, the work-obsessed husband, the hard-working immigrant) but get past the opening section and those characters take on greater depth.
What seems to put some people off the book is the intense weirdness of the city itself -- a dreamlike place where no-one is quite human, even the humans. There's a lot of weirdness to process, and again that's where the hard work comes in. The weirdness starts early and is unrelenting, although even those characters who are permanent residents of Palimpsest become deeper, almost less dream-like as the book moves on -- it's almost like moving from regular dreaming to lucid dreaming, in a way. The more I read of Palimpsest the city, the more I could picture it, the less weird the weird felt, if that makes sense.
Ultimately, I'm glad I chose to follow Oleg, Sei, November and Ludovico on their journey, rather than turning my back on Palimpsest like that minor character by drugging myself with something less dream-like. The more I read of her work, the more I feel that while Cat Valente is not an easy writer to read she is a writer worth reading.
Back in May, when I was reading the short story anthology Paper Cities, I read and reviewed Cat Valente's short story "Palimpsest." At the time, I didn't know that story was excerpted from her novel of the same name. It was the choice to make the novel her August book club selection by
calico_reaction that clued me in to the world of Palimpsest existing in longer form. I enjoyed the short story, as you can see from my brief comments here. I also enjoyed the novel, although I had to work harder at it."I had to work harder at it" sounds awfully negative now that I read it on the screen. I considered rephrasing that sentence, but I'm not going to. It says what I want it to say: Palimpsest is not a mindless beach read. It's not trope-filling SF, the kind of thing you can sort of let your attention wander and still know what's going on. Palimpsest the novel requires your attention the way Palimpsest the city requires the devotion of its inhabitants and visitors. You can choose, like one minor character in the book, to walk away if the work is too weird for you. Honestly, I almost did walk away. As much as I've enjoyed Ms. Valente's short stories, I was on vacation and didn't want to tax my brain too hard. It was being introduced to that minor character who gives up on Palimpsest that made me decide to stick it out; I'm not one to normally give up on a book anyway (the list of books I couldn't bring myself to finish is a short list indeed), but something about a minor character wishing she'd never heard of the place the four major characters (and several other secondary ones) are willing to hurt themselves to move to made me decide to see the novel through and find out if either her sacrifice of the city or the major characters' sacrifices of parts of themselves (literally and figuratively) was the wiser, more noble choice.
I realize I have not summarized the book at all, or given you any indication of what it's about. An online friend commented that it's a book about "a sexually-transmitted city." That's the high concept: people can only find Palimpsest after they've had sex with someone who has been to Palimpsest, after which a portion of a map of the city becomes a permanent tattoo somewhere on their flesh. After that, they can only return to Palimpsest, as 'immigrants,' by having sex with other people who have been tattoed by the city. Many of the characters wonder what it takes to go from immigrant to emigre, and would gladly pay whatever price -- the city is that addictive for them.
A book can't survive on high concept alone. Well, okay, some books can and become wildly popular because they are nothing but high concept. This particular high concept wouldn't sustain itself, though, if it were just a series of orgiastic vignettes. Well, okay, again some books would, but I'd lose interest quickly. Each of the main characters needs something the city can provide, each of them is searching for something they've lost. Valente creates a main quartet of characters that is international, intergenerational, intergender and fluid intersexual -- a pretty good cross-section of society. They may start out as "types" (the disaffected Asian, the lonely young spinster, the work-obsessed husband, the hard-working immigrant) but get past the opening section and those characters take on greater depth.
What seems to put some people off the book is the intense weirdness of the city itself -- a dreamlike place where no-one is quite human, even the humans. There's a lot of weirdness to process, and again that's where the hard work comes in. The weirdness starts early and is unrelenting, although even those characters who are permanent residents of Palimpsest become deeper, almost less dream-like as the book moves on -- it's almost like moving from regular dreaming to lucid dreaming, in a way. The more I read of Palimpsest the city, the more I could picture it, the less weird the weird felt, if that makes sense.
Ultimately, I'm glad I chose to follow Oleg, Sei, November and Ludovico on their journey, rather than turning my back on Palimpsest like that minor character by drugging myself with something less dream-like. The more I read of her work, the more I feel that while Cat Valente is not an easy writer to read she is a writer worth reading.
Teaser Tuesday for August 24th
Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:
* Grab your current read.
* Open to a random page.
* Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page.
* BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
* Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!
Here's my teaser from "The Sun Never Rises in the Big City," the lead-off story in Jeremy C. Shipp's soon to be released new short fiction collection FUNGUS OF THE HEART:
I could hire a private investigator, but I’m sure he’d wonder why I’d spend so much money investigating the death of a rag. He’d look down on me, so that’s out of the question.
I can’t call the police either, because they’d just laugh at me. Legally, killing a rag isn’t murder. And according to the handbook, in the case of a rag’s death, we’re supposed to call up the Agency and ask for a replacement.
Because people are cheap. Investigations aren’t.
* Grab your current read.
* Open to a random page.
* Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page.
* BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
* Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!
Here's my teaser from "The Sun Never Rises in the Big City," the lead-off story in Jeremy C. Shipp's soon to be released new short fiction collection FUNGUS OF THE HEART:
I could hire a private investigator, but I’m sure he’d wonder why I’d spend so much money investigating the death of a rag. He’d look down on me, so that’s out of the question.
I can’t call the police either, because they’d just laugh at me. Legally, killing a rag isn’t murder. And according to the handbook, in the case of a rag’s death, we’re supposed to call up the Agency and ask for a replacement.
Because people are cheap. Investigations aren’t.
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Advs of Holmes
Book 45: The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, contained in The Complete Sherlock Holmes Volume 1, isbn 9781593080341, 265 pages, Barnes And Noble Classics, $7.95
I decided not long ago that I really needed to go back and read some (or all) of Doyle's original Holmes work, to be able to more capably judge how the stories by more recent writers stack up to those of Holmes' creator. Since there seem to be new Holmes short stories in every issue of The Strand magazine and in just about every period mystery anthology, I decided to skip rereading A Study In Scarlet and The Sign of the Four, the first two Holmes novels, and proceed to the first short story collection.
Of course, I've reviewed all of the individual stories over on the![[info]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_sBRDGru_fEzNxdjIa_zERCBgolGBp0m7wyBJNgAILExpDHv4247MOa1PT0iVeeq3Vks53L_NRpMrKbXcHdTeVSO_n1aSSf7Bn5WlyDlXX23f-X=s0-d)
365shortstories community. If you want my individual thoughts (with pretty much no spoilers), you can check that out.
Overall, the collection really brings out certain facets of Holmes' personality. Some of them are repeated in story after story: the penchant for closing his eyes and ducking his head when he's trying to think in public; the habit of having reached a conclusion from the barest set of clues even before the parties involved give him more details. That last part, of course, is what makes him The Great Detective. It's also a bit infuriating for someone brought up on "fair play mysteries." The most important details of most of these cases tend to get noticed by Holmes when he's off-screen rather than when Watson is with him to show how Holmes got to that detail.
The other facet of Holmes' personality that really shines through in these stories is his attitude towards women. Much is often made of how Holmes refers to Irene Adler as "The Woman," and how she is the only woman who ever earned his respect because she outsmarted him in one particular case. I've seen many a review talking about how misogynistic Holmes is, that he veritably hates women. But in story after story in this collection he goes out of his way to protect women, whether it be physically (by warning Violet Hunter to stay away from a situation Holmes would not let any sister of his get involved in) or emotionally (by helping men who have wronged women pay their dues without the women being further emotionally injured). I can't say I approve of Holmes' decisions in every case where a woman's feelings were in danger of being hurt, but I can say that I find it an interesting aspect of his character. (And speaking of Ms. Hunter -- at the end of the story in which she appears, she seems to have gained high respect from both Holmes and Watson, and this time for not outwitting Holmes but matching him detail-for-detail.)
There are a few classic tales in this particular collection: A Scandal in Bohemia introduces Irene Adler; The Red-Headed League is just a fun outing; The Adventure of the Speckled Band and The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb are the most gothic-feeling of the tales; and The Adventure of the Copper Beeches introduces Violet Hunter. The stories I enjoyed the least: The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet seemed forced and The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor felt like a retread of the much more interesting A Case of Identity.
I decided not long ago that I really needed to go back and read some (or all) of Doyle's original Holmes work, to be able to more capably judge how the stories by more recent writers stack up to those of Holmes' creator. Since there seem to be new Holmes short stories in every issue of The Strand magazine and in just about every period mystery anthology, I decided to skip rereading A Study In Scarlet and The Sign of the Four, the first two Holmes novels, and proceed to the first short story collection.
Of course, I've reviewed all of the individual stories over on the
365shortstories community. If you want my individual thoughts (with pretty much no spoilers), you can check that out.Overall, the collection really brings out certain facets of Holmes' personality. Some of them are repeated in story after story: the penchant for closing his eyes and ducking his head when he's trying to think in public; the habit of having reached a conclusion from the barest set of clues even before the parties involved give him more details. That last part, of course, is what makes him The Great Detective. It's also a bit infuriating for someone brought up on "fair play mysteries." The most important details of most of these cases tend to get noticed by Holmes when he's off-screen rather than when Watson is with him to show how Holmes got to that detail.
The other facet of Holmes' personality that really shines through in these stories is his attitude towards women. Much is often made of how Holmes refers to Irene Adler as "The Woman," and how she is the only woman who ever earned his respect because she outsmarted him in one particular case. I've seen many a review talking about how misogynistic Holmes is, that he veritably hates women. But in story after story in this collection he goes out of his way to protect women, whether it be physically (by warning Violet Hunter to stay away from a situation Holmes would not let any sister of his get involved in) or emotionally (by helping men who have wronged women pay their dues without the women being further emotionally injured). I can't say I approve of Holmes' decisions in every case where a woman's feelings were in danger of being hurt, but I can say that I find it an interesting aspect of his character. (And speaking of Ms. Hunter -- at the end of the story in which she appears, she seems to have gained high respect from both Holmes and Watson, and this time for not outwitting Holmes but matching him detail-for-detail.)
There are a few classic tales in this particular collection: A Scandal in Bohemia introduces Irene Adler; The Red-Headed League is just a fun outing; The Adventure of the Speckled Band and The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb are the most gothic-feeling of the tales; and The Adventure of the Copper Beeches introduces Violet Hunter. The stories I enjoyed the least: The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet seemed forced and The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor felt like a retread of the much more interesting A Case of Identity.
Friday, August 13, 2010
Holmes in brief
254. The Adventure of the Speckled Band Holmes once again comes to the rescue of a pretty young damsel in distress. This one is concerned that her step-father and the gypsies in residence on his property are somehow complicit in the death of her sister, who was due to be wed. The action takes place in the town of Stokes Moran, and for some reason I expected a connection to Col. Sebastian Moran, aide-de-camp to the notorious Prof. Moriarity, Holmes' nemesis. But there is no connection (at least not in the story itself. I'd have to read back through various Wold-Newton sites to see if any later authors came up with a connection). The story moves quickly, and Holmes of course spots the key details everyone else has missed. Several early details are essentially red herrings.
255. The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb Doctor Watson is brought an intriguing patient: a young civil engineer who has somehow lost his thumb. Once he's patched up as best as Watson can manage, Watson brings Holmes on board to hear the man's story. How he lost his thumb is not the mystery Holmes needs to solve, but rather where the man lost his thumb and who the perpetrators really were. Another of those cases in which Holmes solves the crime but doesn't catch the criminals.
256. The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor Doyle seems to like these stories in which one member of a wedding party disappears before, during, or just after the nuptial ceremony. (Jim Butcher somewhat pays tribute to this trope in his Harry Dresden story Heorot.) This time, it is the newlywed husband who is left without a spouse when his new bride disappears during a post-wedding luncheon. The facts of the mystery itself are a good read, although I do wish more of them had been hinted at in the story itself.
257. The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet The implication at the start of the story is that the Important Person who hocks the royal beryl coronet to a banker for a loan is Prince Albert. In our modern day and age, it's almost impossible to imagine someone so well known being able to visit a major banker in full daylight business hours to hock a piece of jewelry that normally resides in a locked guarded case. The late 1800s were a simpler time, for sure. The main mystery is not why "Prince Albert" put the coronet up as collateral for a loan (that's never revealed by Doyle in the story), but rather how the coronet is almost stolen and definitely damaged by someone in the banker's household. Holmes believes the man arrested for the crime didn't do it and sets about to prove himself right. I felt like this was one of the fairer-play mysteries in this set. I could not only understand how Holmes got to his conclusion, I could actually go back and see the hints where they were dropped.
258. The Adventure of the Copper Beeches Much is made of the fact that Irene Adler, or "The Woman," is the only woman for whom Holmes ever showed actual respect as an equal. In this story, Holmes and Watson meet a young governess named Violet Hunter, and I humbly submit that Miss Hunter shows as much mental fortitude and attention to detail as Holmes himself. Adler may be the woman who outwitted Holmes, but Hunter is the one who essentially matches him stride for stride. She starts out a little demure and unsure of herself, but by the end she has gained Watson's respect and I suspect Holmes' as well.
And that wraps up the first Holmes short story collection. I'm going to hold off on starting Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes for a little bit so as to cleanse the palate a bit, so to speak.
255. The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb Doctor Watson is brought an intriguing patient: a young civil engineer who has somehow lost his thumb. Once he's patched up as best as Watson can manage, Watson brings Holmes on board to hear the man's story. How he lost his thumb is not the mystery Holmes needs to solve, but rather where the man lost his thumb and who the perpetrators really were. Another of those cases in which Holmes solves the crime but doesn't catch the criminals.
256. The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor Doyle seems to like these stories in which one member of a wedding party disappears before, during, or just after the nuptial ceremony. (Jim Butcher somewhat pays tribute to this trope in his Harry Dresden story Heorot.) This time, it is the newlywed husband who is left without a spouse when his new bride disappears during a post-wedding luncheon. The facts of the mystery itself are a good read, although I do wish more of them had been hinted at in the story itself.
257. The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet The implication at the start of the story is that the Important Person who hocks the royal beryl coronet to a banker for a loan is Prince Albert. In our modern day and age, it's almost impossible to imagine someone so well known being able to visit a major banker in full daylight business hours to hock a piece of jewelry that normally resides in a locked guarded case. The late 1800s were a simpler time, for sure. The main mystery is not why "Prince Albert" put the coronet up as collateral for a loan (that's never revealed by Doyle in the story), but rather how the coronet is almost stolen and definitely damaged by someone in the banker's household. Holmes believes the man arrested for the crime didn't do it and sets about to prove himself right. I felt like this was one of the fairer-play mysteries in this set. I could not only understand how Holmes got to his conclusion, I could actually go back and see the hints where they were dropped.
258. The Adventure of the Copper Beeches Much is made of the fact that Irene Adler, or "The Woman," is the only woman for whom Holmes ever showed actual respect as an equal. In this story, Holmes and Watson meet a young governess named Violet Hunter, and I humbly submit that Miss Hunter shows as much mental fortitude and attention to detail as Holmes himself. Adler may be the woman who outwitted Holmes, but Hunter is the one who essentially matches him stride for stride. She starts out a little demure and unsure of herself, but by the end she has gained Watson's respect and I suspect Holmes' as well.
And that wraps up the first Holmes short story collection. I'm going to hold off on starting Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes for a little bit so as to cleanse the palate a bit, so to speak.
Thursday, August 12, 2010
THE FIRFLAKE giveaway!
Okay, it's time for me to do it: I'm having a giveaway for THE FIRFLAKE. I'll be giving away 3 copies, one for each social platform I'm running the giveaway on. So that means one winner on Livejournal, one winner on Blogspot, and one winner on Facebook.
THE FIRFLAKE is my self-published short Christmas book, available through Amazon and even by order through your local independent bookstore. The cover, and interior art, are by the great Don Cornue:
Additional Info: I will of course Sign and Personalize the winning copies. I will ship for free anywhere in the US, Canada and Europe.
HOW TO ENTER:
1. Respond to any of the posts (Livejournal, Blogspot or Facebook) by answering the following question:
What is your favorite Christmas story or legend? (Saying my book is your favorite will not get you an extra entry, but choosing my favorite story not of my own creation will!)
2. Provide a mailing address to which the book can be sent, and a way to contact you if you win so I can find out who you'd like the book personalized for.
3. Gain extra entries by Tweeting, Blogging, Stumbleuponing, etc -- one extra entry for each time you advertise for me, but you MUST provide me with a link to eachTweet, Blog, Facebook post, etc. One extra entry per social platform/network.
4. Deadline is 11:59pm Friday, AUGUST 19th, 2010. Then I will choose the winners randomly from all of the entries and begin contacting, etc.
GOOD LUCK, ALL!
THE FIRFLAKE is my self-published short Christmas book, available through Amazon and even by order through your local independent bookstore. The cover, and interior art, are by the great Don Cornue:
Product Description
"But what if I'm looking near the field and the Firflake falls by the old stream?"
Engleberta Ruprecht is this year's Watcher, and she takes her job seriously. The Watcher is tasked with waiting for the first snowflake of winter and leading Papa Knecht, the head of the family, to where the Firflake will fall. While the parents prepare for the special day, Papa Knecht and Mama Alvarie gather the grandchildren and tell stories.
They tell the legend of the Firflake, a story of cold northern plains and whipping winds.They also tell how Papa, when he was just a young man, went out to explore the wide world. How on a cold winter's night in a small town, Papa was attacked by a group of young men, and then rescued by a tall stranger named Nicholas. And how Papa and Nicholas' friendship became the foundation for the family's long Christmas tradition.
Told in the best winter campfire storytelling tradition, The Firflake: A Christmas Story is a tale full of familiar Christmas stories told in a new light.
Engleberta Ruprecht is this year's Watcher, and she takes her job seriously. The Watcher is tasked with waiting for the first snowflake of winter and leading Papa Knecht, the head of the family, to where the Firflake will fall. While the parents prepare for the special day, Papa Knecht and Mama Alvarie gather the grandchildren and tell stories.
They tell the legend of the Firflake, a story of cold northern plains and whipping winds.They also tell how Papa, when he was just a young man, went out to explore the wide world. How on a cold winter's night in a small town, Papa was attacked by a group of young men, and then rescued by a tall stranger named Nicholas. And how Papa and Nicholas' friendship became the foundation for the family's long Christmas tradition.
Told in the best winter campfire storytelling tradition, The Firflake: A Christmas Story is a tale full of familiar Christmas stories told in a new light.
About the Author
Anthony R. Cardno finds a way to work storytelling into everything he does. He has spent time as a classroom teacher, environmental educator and instructor on environmental law. He grew up in the Hudson Valley region of New York and has lived in northwestern New Jersey for the past twelve years. His short works have appeared in Willard & Maple and SYBIL magazines.Additional Info: I will of course Sign and Personalize the winning copies. I will ship for free anywhere in the US, Canada and Europe.
HOW TO ENTER:
1. Respond to any of the posts (Livejournal, Blogspot or Facebook) by answering the following question:
What is your favorite Christmas story or legend? (Saying my book is your favorite will not get you an extra entry, but choosing my favorite story not of my own creation will!)
2. Provide a mailing address to which the book can be sent, and a way to contact you if you win so I can find out who you'd like the book personalized for.
3. Gain extra entries by Tweeting, Blogging, Stumbleuponing, etc -- one extra entry for each time you advertise for me, but you MUST provide me with a link to eachTweet, Blog, Facebook post, etc. One extra entry per social platform/network.
4. Deadline is 11:59pm Friday, AUGUST 19th, 2010. Then I will choose the winners randomly from all of the entries and begin contacting, etc.
GOOD LUCK, ALL!
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Hunt in Shanghai
Book 44: Hunt Among The Killers of Men by Gabriel Hunt, as told to David J. Schow, isbn 9780843962567, 265 pages, Leisure Adventure, $6.99
The fifth of six projected Gabriel Hunt adventures finds our man Hunt in Shanghai and nearby, searching for a missing friend of his younger sister, hoping to find her before she can get revenge on the Chinese mobster who killed her own sister. This being a Hunt adventure, some sort of ancient treasure or ancient legend must come into play. This time it is the legendary Killers of Men -- the terra-cotta army of Chinese warlord Kangxi Shih-K'ai which is supposed to include the warlord's entombed body.
Hunt books are always a thrill-ride. This one is no exception. There are a number of "set-piece action sequences" that you can easily picture being in the next Bourne or Salt movie. Where previous Hunt installments felt like "Indiana Jones in the modern era" thanks to most of the objects being sought having mythological qualities (the fountain of youth, sphinxes, a city under the polar ice cap), this book felt more like a modern spy thriller thanks to the treasure being of more recent vintage and less mystical (the statues are needed for purely mundane, gangster-war reasons). In fact, I didn't realize how heavily I was expecting things to take a supernatural bend until the final end-gambit started and I realized there would be no actual supernatural event this time. "Co-author" David J. Schow actually writes a bit against type here. He's known for horror, especially splatterpunk, and for the scripts for various slasher flick franchises. I expected a more horror-based story and was pleasantly surprised to get this spy-thriller instead. The action sequences fly fast and furious, the dialogue is pretty snappy. Another change from previous Hunt books: there are almost as many scenes without Gabriel as there are with. Schow takes full advantage of his movie script experience to write a Hunt book that really feels like it's ready to be a movie: high on action, decent on character, low on CGI needs.
Characterization is always present at some level. Over the course of five books Gabriel, his brother Michael, and even their sister Lucy, have all been drawn well. At first Gabriel and Michael were fairly stock -- if Gabe was Indy, Michael was a young Marcus Brody; if Gabe is Doc Savage, Michael is Renny. Lucy appears not at all in the first few books, and we don't get too much of her personality in the one book before this that she's a main part of. Schow uses her sparingly, but gives us more of her personality and more of her relationship with Gabriel (although notably not with Michael) from when they were kids. Series editor Charles Ardai also smartly lets Schow add some detail to the mystery of the Missing Hunt Parents. Ambrose and Cordelia Hunt have been missing since a mass disappearance off of an ocean liner on the eve of "the millenium," and we learn a little bit about what they were investigated prior to that cruise in this tale. Schow also gives us the requisite Hunt femme fatales / damsels in distress, but puts a welcome different spin on them.
So, final verdict: if the more Indiana Jones stylings of the earlier books in the series were not your thing, give KILLERS OF MEN a try and I think you'll enjoy it. And if those earlier stylings were your thing -- well, variety is the spice of life, and it's good for series characters to have their adventures break from the formula occasionally!
There is one more Hunt book left, HUNT THROUGH NAPOLEON'S WEB, due out in a few months. With the closing of Dorchester Publishing's mass market paperback division, it seems that the final Gabriel Hunt will be out in e-reader format only at first. But Charles Ardai has vowed that it will come out, and in print eventually. I'm hopefully the last book will bring more details on what happened to the Hunt parents.
The fifth of six projected Gabriel Hunt adventures finds our man Hunt in Shanghai and nearby, searching for a missing friend of his younger sister, hoping to find her before she can get revenge on the Chinese mobster who killed her own sister. This being a Hunt adventure, some sort of ancient treasure or ancient legend must come into play. This time it is the legendary Killers of Men -- the terra-cotta army of Chinese warlord Kangxi Shih-K'ai which is supposed to include the warlord's entombed body.
Hunt books are always a thrill-ride. This one is no exception. There are a number of "set-piece action sequences" that you can easily picture being in the next Bourne or Salt movie. Where previous Hunt installments felt like "Indiana Jones in the modern era" thanks to most of the objects being sought having mythological qualities (the fountain of youth, sphinxes, a city under the polar ice cap), this book felt more like a modern spy thriller thanks to the treasure being of more recent vintage and less mystical (the statues are needed for purely mundane, gangster-war reasons). In fact, I didn't realize how heavily I was expecting things to take a supernatural bend until the final end-gambit started and I realized there would be no actual supernatural event this time. "Co-author" David J. Schow actually writes a bit against type here. He's known for horror, especially splatterpunk, and for the scripts for various slasher flick franchises. I expected a more horror-based story and was pleasantly surprised to get this spy-thriller instead. The action sequences fly fast and furious, the dialogue is pretty snappy. Another change from previous Hunt books: there are almost as many scenes without Gabriel as there are with. Schow takes full advantage of his movie script experience to write a Hunt book that really feels like it's ready to be a movie: high on action, decent on character, low on CGI needs.
Characterization is always present at some level. Over the course of five books Gabriel, his brother Michael, and even their sister Lucy, have all been drawn well. At first Gabriel and Michael were fairly stock -- if Gabe was Indy, Michael was a young Marcus Brody; if Gabe is Doc Savage, Michael is Renny. Lucy appears not at all in the first few books, and we don't get too much of her personality in the one book before this that she's a main part of. Schow uses her sparingly, but gives us more of her personality and more of her relationship with Gabriel (although notably not with Michael) from when they were kids. Series editor Charles Ardai also smartly lets Schow add some detail to the mystery of the Missing Hunt Parents. Ambrose and Cordelia Hunt have been missing since a mass disappearance off of an ocean liner on the eve of "the millenium," and we learn a little bit about what they were investigated prior to that cruise in this tale. Schow also gives us the requisite Hunt femme fatales / damsels in distress, but puts a welcome different spin on them.
So, final verdict: if the more Indiana Jones stylings of the earlier books in the series were not your thing, give KILLERS OF MEN a try and I think you'll enjoy it. And if those earlier stylings were your thing -- well, variety is the spice of life, and it's good for series characters to have their adventures break from the formula occasionally!
There is one more Hunt book left, HUNT THROUGH NAPOLEON'S WEB, due out in a few months. With the closing of Dorchester Publishing's mass market paperback division, it seems that the final Gabriel Hunt will be out in e-reader format only at first. But Charles Ardai has vowed that it will come out, and in print eventually. I'm hopefully the last book will bring more details on what happened to the Hunt parents.
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