Here I am.

Popularity: 1% [?]

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Synopsis:
An aging rock star buys an old suit that brings with it a vengeful spirit with a personal vendetta.

Review:
Let’s just get it out of the way. Joe Hill is Stephen King’s son. His debut novel, Heart-Shaped Box, is a work of horror. And not only is it damn good, it’s good enough to stand on its own.

Hill has crafted a simple, elegant, scary little story that manages to delve deep into the nature of regret and repentance. The spectral figure who haunts Judas Coyne is a terrifying creation from the outset, yet as the story progresses it’s Judas’s inner demons who prove to be most menacing. That makes the book sound pat, glibly matching metaphor to meaning, but that simplicity is the key to the power of the book. By keeping things clean, Hill gives himself a lot of room to explore all kinds of complex emotions, and he manages to do so without sacrificing the relentless forward motion of the horror plot.

More than anything, however, I was taken by the love story. I don’t expect romance from books like these, not the real kind, anyway. So I was surprised to find myself captivated by the relationship between Judas and the ex-stripper he calls Georgia. As the story begins, he’s tired of her, doing all sorts of passive aggressive things to make her leave him. Of course she won’t–and of course this is a worn out story. I would’ve forgiven Hill for leaving it at that, so when he started to tease out an evolution in their relationship I got really excited, and ultimately bought the love story whole. What an unexpected treat.

Popularity: 2% [?]

Picked this meme up from Melanie, in honor of two YA books I read for work this weekend.

The goal of this is to list favourite authors according to last name (with a representative fave book as well).

Atwood, Margaret — Cat’s Eye
Bronte, Charlotte — Jane Eyre
Card, Orson Scott — Ender’s Game
Dragonwagon, Crescent — The Year It Rained (with Paul Zindel)
Eager, Edward — Half Magic
Forster, EM — Howard’s End
Gibson, William — Neuromancer
Hobb, Robin — Ship of Magic
Ishiguro, Kazuo — And Never Let Me Go
Jackson, Shirley — Hangsaman
King, Stephen — The Gunslinger
Lewis, CS — Till We Have Faces
Martin, George RR — Game of Thrones
Novik, Naomi — His Majesty’s Dragon
Oates, Joyce Carol — Blonde
Percy, Walker — The Last Gentleman
Queenan, Joe — If You’re Talking to Me, Your Career Must Be in Trouble
Rendell, Ruth — Judgment in Stone
Smith, Wesley — Culture of Death
Tolkien, JRR — The Return of the King
Undset, Sigrid — Kristin Lavransdatter
Vine, Barbara — A Dark-Adapted Eye
Wharton, Edith — Twilight Sleep
X — I’ll read the next book someone recommends by an author whose last name starts with X.
Yancey, Phillip — Where is God When It Hurts?
Zarr, Sara — Story of a Girl

Popularity: 16% [?]

Quick! It’s an emergency! You just got an urgent call about a family emergency and had to rush to the airport with barely time to grab your wallet and your passport. But now, you’re stuck at the airport with nothing to read. What do you do??

And, no, you did NOT have time to grab your bookbag, or the book next to your bed. You were . . . grocery shopping when you got the call and have nothing with you but your wallet and your passport (which you fortuitously brought with you in case they asked for ID in the ethnic food aisle). This is hypothetical, remember?

This is a no-brainer. If I had to sell my plasma to do it, I would buy books. If I had to sell my passport, I would buy books. There is no way in all the universe that I would get on a plane with nothing to read but Skymall.

I would pick up a new hardcover that I’ve been wanting to read, a Stephen King or Ann Rule paperback I’ve read before, and probably a trade paperback I have not read. Plus a Vanity Fair and some trashy women’s magazine. That should get me through a six hour flight–not that I will read all of that, but I won’t be anxious about running out of things to read.

As Amazon is my witness, I’ll never go bookless again.

Popularity: 8% [?]

Synopsis:
The world has moved on, thanks to climate change, a worldwide oil shortage, and population devastation from superbugs, and in one small corner of New York State, the world is being rebuilt by hand.

Review:
Anyone who spends much time with me will eventually learn that I am obsessed with The Long Emergency, one of World Made By Hand author James Kunstler’s non-fiction treatises. I have always been drawn to the apocalyptic, and now that I am a mother I can worry about the world my daughter will inherit.

World Made By Hand is filled with Kunstlerisms–imagery and expressions that are familiar to anyone who has read his books or spent any time on his blog. He is always at his best when conjuring a decaying post-automobile America, where the suburbs are blighed ghettos and big box stores crumble without power to heat and cool them. The novel is a great introduction to the ideas that obsess Kunstler (and his acolytes, myself included), yet it’s far more hopeful than any of his jeremiads.

The protagonist of World Made By Hand is Robert, who once worked in corporate America, and who now finds himself mayor of an ersatz community in upstate New York. His townspeople just want to get by, but they’re caught between an encroaching band of religious fanatics, and a mini-despot who may have aggressively nefarious intentions towards the town. After a young man is murdered, Robert finds himself at the center of an ancient kind of conflict in a new world that looks like an old one.

I was not expecting World Made By Hand to be as lyrical as it is. If I didn’t know Kunstler’s non-fiction, I’d be taken by the poetry of many of the passages. However, as much as I was tickled to be in on Kunstler’s auto-intertextuality, it distracted me from engaging with the story. That won’t stop me from recommending it–I think it’s more accurate a picture of our future as anything found in the Jetsons!

Popularity: 9% [?]

Picked this up from Becky:

The rules: Top twenty favourite books in no particular order. Don’t think about it for too long. Take twenty minutes only to compile your list. Bold the ones you’ve read, or reread, since you’ve started blogging. Include novels, non fiction and plays.

1. The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
2. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
3. Peyton Place by Grace Metalious
4. Wolves of the Calla by Stephen King
5. Ship of Magic by Robin Hobb
6. Till We Have Faces by CS Lewis
7. A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
8. Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson
9. Arcadia by Tom Stoppard
10. Asylum by Patrick McGrath
11. Rebecca by Daphne DuMaurier
12. Anna Karenina Leo Tolstoy
13. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
14. Hangsaman by Shirley Jackson
15. Private Demons by Judy Oppenheimer
16. Bird by Bird by Anne LaMott
17. The Cloister Walk by Kathleen Norris
18. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis
19. The Long Emergency by James Howard Kunstler
20. Birth at Home by Sheila Kitzinger

Popularity: 23% [?]

This is a total PSA for 2 new photography books from Watson-Guptill. They publish great books on knitting & crafting that I adore reviewing, and they also send me review copies of photography books that my husband says are really awesome. I am not equipped to comment so this is just a shameless plug in the hopes that you’ll click through to buy the from Amazon.

Mastering HDR Photography by Michael Freeman

Use HDR technology to create dramatic images that meld photography and art

High dynamic range imaging, or HDR, is the latest challenge for those who are serious about digital photography. But with that challenge comes an opportunity to expand skills and repertoire into exciting new areas. HDR, originally developed for use with computer-generated images, captures the full range of tones in a scene, reproducing human perception down to the finest detail without lens flare, burnout, or underexposure. Mastering HDR Photography explains exactly how to shoot specifically for HDR, and how to use the new software that lets the photographer combine several images into one glowingly accurate final photo. Step-by-step instructions and sample photographs reveal how to apply these techniques to many different genres, producing results that are part photograph, part work of art.

Understanding Shutter Speed by Bryan Peterson

The first book in the Understanding Photography series, Understanding Exposure, was a runaway best-seller, with more than 250,000 copies sold. Now author Bryan Peterson brings his signature style to another important photography topic: shutter speed. With clear, jargon-free explanations of terms and techniques, plus compelling “before-and-after” photos that pair a mediocre image (created using the wrong shutter speed) with a great image (created using the right shutter speed), this is the definitive practical guide to mastering an often-confusing subject. Topics include freezing and implying motion, panning, zooming, exposure, Bogen Super Clamps, and rendering motion effects with Photoshop, all with helpful guidance for both digital and film formats. Great for beginners and serious amateurs, Understanding Shutter Speed is the definitive handy guide to mastering shutter speed for superb results.

Popularity: 8% [?]

I just added a little store to my little blog. I’ll be updating it frequently, adding categories and new books. Consider it my list of essential reading. Thanks for shopping–buy from my store & help fund my reading addiction…

Popularity: 5% [?]

Synopsis:
A San Francisco lawyer finds herself magically spirited back to ancient Rome, where she ends up running a tavern and weathering a German invasion.

Review:
I’m reading Household Gods for an online book club, and the only reason I didn’t quit this book is because I really like the people in the book club. I am not worried about hurting anyone’s feelings by admitting it, because I’m the one who chose it! It’s been languishing in my TBR stack since Christmas 2006 when my ancient Rome-loving dad gave it to me.

I really had trouble with the fact that Nicole accepted her fate so readily–especially since she was a mother. If I were in her shoes I’d be freaking out worrying about Superfast Baby. I wouldn’t be able to think about anything but getting back to her. Nicole barely thinks about them. It really kept me from connecting with her.

The writing isn’t that great, either. I was hoping for something magnificently trashy like Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander, but this didn’t even come close. However, I am looking forward to hearing what my book club has to say about it–should be a fun discussion.

Popularity: 13% [?]

’cause I think this quiz is confusing Boomer (on the basestar) with Sharon Agathon (on Galactica, married to mmmmmmHelo).

Which Battlestar Galactica Character Are You?

More on Battlestar Galactica. Created by BuddyTV

Popularity: 11% [?]