A lot of crime novels start with things like a gorgeous dame walking into a hard boiled private detective’s office or a world weary cop being called tA lot of crime novels start with things like a gorgeous dame walking into a hard boiled private detective’s office or a world weary cop being called to a brutal crime scene. This one kicks off with a guy thinking his dick has exploded and then later throwing a tray of human feces into another man’s face at a MacDonald’s.
Hey, it’s called Whoop! Whoop!, and the lead character is a Juggalo. It isn’t like I was expecting it to be The Maltese Falcon going into it.
Magnetz is a guy living in Phoenix who can’t hold a job, and he’s pretty much a professional dumbass. The only things he’s got going for him is his adorable young daughter, and his love of the band Insane Clown Posse has given him a family among their dedicated fans, the Juggalos. After a lifetime of bad choices, Magnetz tops himself when he tries to pull a revenge prank and accidentally throws his own crap into another man’s face. Unfortunately, Magnetz got the wrong guy, and the person he shit spackled turns out to be a blood thirsty ex-cop nicknamed Murda Killa who just got out of prison, and now Magnetz has to flee for his life and try to find a way out of the mess he created as Murda Killa hunts him.
I’m not a fan of ICP, and I’d generally agree with the idea that a person who throws a bunch of feces on another person pretty much deserves whatever they get. So why read a book that asks me to sympathize with a Juggalo poop flinger? A little bird told me that the author Icy Thug Nutz is actually Johnny Shaw, and that’s a guy I actually trust to tell a story like this and make it funny instead of just gross. Although in fairness, it is pretty gross.
Still Shaw has the knack of writing stupid people doing stupid, disgusting things and making it entertaining. That’s exactly what he’s done here with this fast paced farce, and at a time when I needed some laughs it hit the spot. Even with all the gross insanity going on in this book, Shaw manages to give Magnetz some emotional depth so that you actually do feel bad for the big doofus even if the whole situation was his own fault.
It’s a little odd to read this after Shaw’s last book The Southland, which was a very serious and mature novel that dug into the world of undocumented Mexican workers being exploited in the US. It shows that he’s the kind of writer who can a lot of different things, and he does them all well.
Public Service Announcement: I got a free copy of this for review, and I'm told that it isn't for sale on Amazon. If anyone is interested it can be found on the publisher's website....more
First comes the review, and then if you keep reading you’ll get the funny story of how I crossed paths with the author of this one. How’s that for a tFirst comes the review, and then if you keep reading you’ll get the funny story of how I crossed paths with the author of this one. How’s that for a teaser?
Dayna Anderson had 15 minutes of fame thanks to starring in a string of TV commercials for a fast-food chicken place. However, after losing that gig she’s now struggling to get by, and she’s desperate to make some quick cash to prevent the bank from foreclosing on her parents’ house. Inspiration comes after Dayna sees a billboard offering a large cash reward for tips on the hit-and-run death of a young woman, and Dayna realizes that she and some friends had almost been struck by a reckless car that was most likely the same one that killed the girl.
At first Dayna is just hoping that finding out the details of the crime will help jog her memory so that she can give the cops a clue and claim the reward, but soon she finds herself drawn into the mystery. Once Dayna sets out to find the killer not even the quickly dwindling minutes on her phone plan can stop her investigation.
Amateur sleuths usually aren’t my favorite sub-genre of mysteries, but I had a really good time with this one. Kellye Garrett has a great sense of comedic timing in her writing, and there was many a laugh-out-loud moment. (I listened to the audio version, and narrator Bahni Turpin helped the jokes land as well.) The celebrity obsessed culture of Hollywood is used to great effect with Dayna’s humorous observations about it. It’s also a nice touch that Dayna isn’t just pointing and mocking. She is part of that world so while she may poke gentle fun at her best friend’s relentless seeking of fame, it’s done with affection.
I also enjoyed Dayna because after reading about a ton of super-macho tough guy detectives it was refreshing to have someone who doesn’t really know what they’re doing as a lead character. Not that Dayna comes across as stupid, just inexperienced, and enthusiasm often gets the better of her common sense. That helps add to the comedic elements, but her pure determination and a wealth of knowledge from watching true crime shows keep Dayna hot on the trail of the killer even as she’s clueless about her own love life. She’s a classic underdog that you can’t help but root for.
Overall, it’s a funny and entertaining mystery with a great lead character that has some very witty observations about Hollywood.
And now for the bonus story…
I was at Bouchercon in Dallas last fall, and in addition to seeing some of my favorite writers I watched several interesting people I had never read before on panels so I made a point out of buying a copy of their books and trying to meet them at some point. That’s already paid off with in my recent reading of books by authors like Eryk Pruitt, Jennifer Hillier, and SA (Shawn) Cosby.
Unfortunately, none of those authors was Kellye Garrett.
In fact, I had never heard of her or seen her on any panels. So I probably sounded completely rude and ignorant when I happened to meet her in the hotel bar one night and asked her what kind of stuff she wrote. The extra embarrassing thing for me is that although I didn’t know it at the time she had just come from the Anthony Awards where she had been nominated for Best Novel. She politely told me about this series and game me a promotional card for one of the books.
Afterwards, I started following several of the other authors on Twitter, and Kellye’s name kept coming up. That’s where I saw that her books were about to be released on Audible so I had this on deck when I read My Darkest Prayer. I noted in in my review that that Shawn Cosby had been a huge presence at Bouchercon.
And who should just so happen to comment on that review? That’s right. Kellye Garrett. She was shocked to hear that we had met at that Bouchercon. (I was relived that she didn’t say, “Oh, you were THAT asshole?!?) Then it was my turn to be shocked when she complimented me on some of the reviews I’d done on the Spenser series she’d read before.
After all that I felt like I was destined to read this book, and I'm glad I did....more
I enjoyed this collection of humorous drawings so I have posted this message on the part of the computer network known as Adequate Eye Scans. It is owI enjoyed this collection of humorous drawings so I have posted this message on the part of the computer network known as Adequate Eye Scans. It is owned by the same large company from which I purchased the collection so that they might sell more of them and become even larger. I am mildly uncomfortable about this process.
I am also aware that if other beings disagree with my assessment of the drawings, they will tell me in rude tones that I am incorrect.
Ah, but seriously folks...
I find Nathan Pyle's cartoons of aliens going about their daily lives wildly funny. There's just something about how he uses language to describe common things that makes me laugh. For example, instead of teeth, they are your mouthstones, and most of us fail at the recommended daily task of pushing string through them.
Reading his cartoons on social media every day are the closest thing I get to that old feeling when I'd crack open a newspaper and read the comics so I was happy to support him by buying this. It's not long, but it put a smile on my face....more
A small order of monks have lived on New York’s Park Avenue for almost two centuries. They managed to keep their monastery as the city grew thanks to A small order of monks have lived on New York’s Park Avenue for almost two centuries. They managed to keep their monastery as the city grew thanks to a ninety-nine year lease, but they’re surprised to learn that the lease is almost up and that their entire block is about to be sold to build a new office building.
As part of the attempts to save their building Brother Benedict is forced to leave his beloved quiet monastery several times to deal with the family that held the lease and the business people who are buying it. When Brother Benedict meets and falls for a woman involved in the deal he finds himself questioning whether he belongs with her or with his fellow monks. He’ll also learn that all’s fair in love, war, and New York real estate.
This continues the trend I’m on of reading a Hard Case Crime novel only to find it distinctly lacking in hard case crime. Several of the recent ones have been character based stories with a few crime elements in them, and despite this being a long out-of-print novel by a legendary mystery writer it’s more of a low key comedy than anything.
That’s not to say that it’s bad. I’m a big fan of almost everything Donald Westlake did, and the man could shift gears from gritty crime stories to goofy capers and make them both entertaining. Like most of his lighter stuff it’s entertaining and provides plenty of chuckles although the ending is a little abrupt and bittersweet. It’s fun enough although I’m still scratching my head at why HCC printed it other than to put the Westlake name on the cover.
Slightly off-topic bonus thought: Reading this story about quirky monks dealing with a 1975 New York City reminded me in a weird way of a Wes Anderson movie. I’m not saying that a Westlake book exactly seems like an Anderson screenplay. More that I think that the ‘70s setting, quirky characters, and style of dialogue would be a good fit for an Anderson adaptation. Once that idea was in my head I couldn’t stop thinking of Bill Murray playing the abbot. So if anybody out there knows Wes Anderson, do me a favor and get him a copy of this....more
Should someone be put in prison for a practical joke?
Yes. All practical jokers belong in jail. Or hell.
Harry has been an unrepentant prankster his eShould someone be put in prison for a practical joke?
Yes. All practical jokers belong in jail. Or hell.
Harry has been an unrepentant prankster his entire life, but now he has been locked up after one of his jokes went wrong which resulted in several injuries. Once inside he quickly bumbles onto the secret of several other inmates. There was an opportunity during construction of a prison expansion to build a tunnel which they use to regularly leave. This isn’t for escape because none of these guys have long enough sentences to want to live on the run, but rather they just use the tunnel to go out and do the things they can’t while in jail only to return each night. Harry gets cut in on the scheme, and he enjoys the quasi-freedom it allows him. However, there’s a big catch. The inmates have realized that they have the ultimate alibi of being in prison so they've got an ambitious plan to rob two banks at once, and they demand that Harry take part in it. This puts Harry in a real bind since he may be in jail, but he’s no crook.
The late Donald Westlake was capable of doing both drama and comedy well, and as a lighthearted story written for yucks it works surprisingly well. I was worried in the early going because I really dislike practical jokers, and I thought that he’d be asking a reader to find Harry’s pranks hilarious. Instead Westlake makes it clear that this behavior is beyond annoying, but that Harry has a sick compulsion even when he knows the warden is watching him like a hawk and that his fellow inmates will murder him if they find out he's the one responsible. The humor comes from just how incapable Harry is of stopping, and the casual way we learn about the reign of terror he’s inflicting on hardened criminals. There’s a lesson for Harry in this story so that kept the book from asking me to be on the side of a guy who thinks tying someone’s shoe laces together is funny.
There’s also a running gag about Harry’s last name sounding like a vulgar term which I’m not gonna try to replicate here because I don’t have the patience to figure out how to do an umlaut. As with the practical joke angle I worried that Westlake was going for the most obvious and juvenile thing when it actually turns out to have some deeper meaning explaining Harry’s behavior.
So what we end up with is an enjoyable caper that makes for an entertaining couple of hours of fun reading.
However, I do find myself wishing that Westlake might have used this idea in one of his serious crime books he wrote as Richard Stark. If the humorless thief Parker would have run across a practical joker who screwed up his plans to rob a bank, and then got his big meaty paws around that guy’s neck and squeezed until he turned purple…. Yeah, that’d make for a pretty satisfying book, too....more
Down these mean streets a man must go. Or to be more accurate in the case of Sammy ‘Two Toes’ Tiffin – down these mean streets a man must limp.
It’s 19Down these mean streets a man must go. Or to be more accurate in the case of Sammy ‘Two Toes’ Tiffin – down these mean streets a man must limp.
It’s 1947 in San Francisco where Sammy is a good guy with some skeletons in his closet who works as a bartender which is how he meets a beautiful blonde named Stilton, a/k/a the Cheese. As far as Sammy is concerned the Cheese stands alone, and he falls for her instantly. Unfortunately, his attempts at romance are hindered by his sleazy boss insisting that he procure some women for an Air Force general who wants to take them into the woods to provide entertainment for an elite club made up of influential men. Sammy is also working on get-rich-quick scheme that involves selling a deadly snake, there’s a racist cop causing trouble, and the news has reports about a strange incident in Roswell, New Mexico.
Since this was Christopher Moore writing a book called Noir I wasn’t expecting it to be James Cain or Jim Thompson. However, I was kind of hoping that he might stretch himself a little and be a bit less Christopher Moore. That's why I ultimately found this kind of disappointing because he gives it a try at first, but quickly throws it out the window to just write what he always does.
That’s the shame of it because the first couple of chapters do come across as Moore actually satirizing a noir novel with overblown pulpy language and a bunch of really solid jokes based on the concept. If he’d have stuck with that and resisted the urge to just do his usual thing of introducing the weird and/or supernatural he might have really had something. But then we get to the stuff about the aliens, and while it’s still got some laughs, it’s also a formula that Moore has done in pretty much every book.
I also found the shifting POV to be problematic. We start off with Sammy in the first person which lets him do the parody of the classic hard boiled crime novel which I wanted more of. But then Moore shifts to a third person narration which we later find out is coming from a very unlikely source. So the book starts off with this distinct voice which I was into, but when it shifts into something else which is when it becomes standard Moore. Then he tries to go back to first person Sammy telling the story, but he’d lost the tone of what he started with. Which was what I liked best and wanted more of.
It’s not a complete waste of time. Moore is just inherently funny and there are a lot of solid gags and lines that made me chuckle. But I wish he’d managed to actually write a noir parody instead of just doing the thing that comes easiest to him. If he wanted to write something in this time period and have aliens in it then why not do a pulpy '50s sci-fi kind of thing rather than claiming in the title that it's going to be a genre that it has almost nothing to do with?...more
I received an advance copy of this from NetGalley for review.
Elvis and horror go together like a peanut butter-n-banana sandwich. Which is to say thatI received an advance copy of this from NetGalley for review.
Elvis and horror go together like a peanut butter-n-banana sandwich. Which is to say that it catches your attention, but it might not be something you’d want to make a regular part of your diet.
This is a prequel story to Lansdale’s Bubba Ho-Tep in which we learned that the rumors about Elvis faking his death were true, and that he was living out his final days in a shitty nursing home where he gets into a scrap with a mummy. Here we’ve got The King and one his minions, a bodyguard/hanger-on named Johnny Smack, who secretly fight evil supernatural beings under the command of Presley’s manager, Colonel Tom Parker. The Colonel pulls Elvis away from his Las Vegas shows to go on a mission to New Orleans where interdimensional vampires have been turning people into living basketballs while draining away their essence. Several other monster fighters are brought in to help vanquish them, and they all soon fight themselves in a terrifying fight for their lives.
It’s a real mixed bag here with Lansdale doing some genuinely creepy horror of a kind I haven’t read from him in a while, and the idea that Elvis led this double life as a fighter against the evil is kinda enjoyable. My favorite part involved Elvis and his crew trying to hold off the bad guys by going Alamo in a house protected by magic and a horny ghost, and there’s another good bit that involves taking a pink Cadillac into another dimension which is wonky fun. However, a lot of time is spent trying to explain how the guy who became a fat jump-suited pill-addicted joke about this time was actually a tormented bad ass. If you’re going to do a book like this then I get that Lansdale has to pump Elvis up into more than a handsome guy with a great voice and sex appeal who eventually became a victim of his own success into something more substantial, but it just didn’t work for me.
I also really liked both the original story and movie adaptation of Bubba Ho-Tep which played more into the idea of a ‘realistic’ older and faded Elvis who doesn’t know anything about monsters looking back at his life with regret and making one last stand to reclaim some of his old glory and dignity. This undercuts that idea with the revised history although Lansdale makes a mighty attempt of stitching it together into a retconned timeline.
This also has one of my pet peeves of an author putting a bunch of similar looking names together with Elvis’ team consisting of Johnny, John Henry, Jack, and Jenny so apparently this book was sponsored by the letter ‘J’. It’s extra aggravating when you’re reading a poorly formatted advanced e-version that has turned much of the text into word salad and makes it even more confusing.
As a Lansdale fan who got it for free I enjoyed it well enough, but it looks like this is going to be originally released as another one of his collector’s edition hardback, and the current price on Amazon is $40 for 200 pages. That’s way too much money both the quantity and quality of story you’d get for the price....more
Jimmy Veeder is simple kind of guy who just wants to get married, raise his son, drink beer with his friends, and work on his farm. Unfortunately, he’Jimmy Veeder is simple kind of guy who just wants to get married, raise his son, drink beer with his friends, and work on his farm. Unfortunately, he’s also the kind of guy who can accidently get on the bad side of a drug cartel kingpin while on his honeymoon in Mexico. In other words, poor ole Jimmy is just a shit magnet.
The books in this series are labeled as Jimmy Veeder Fiascos, and this third one certainly lives up to that billing. After Jimmy’s ill-fated trip to Mexico he returns to his home town in California’s Imperial Valley, but with a small army of cartel goons hot on his trail Jimmy has to turn to his friends for help. Since most of Jimmy’s pals are a collection of small town hell-raisers who thrive on drinking and fighting it isn’t exactly a group of tactical geniuses he can call on. But then again it’s not exactly like Jimmy is known for his long term planning skills either.
Johnny Shaw is one of those writers who is just flat-out funny. Both Jimmy’s first person narration and the dialogue are laced with hilarious lines that get me to laugh out loud, and he’s got a knack for mixing that with action along with some emotional stakes to feel like it all matters. I also appreciate that with Jimmy he’s created a regular fella with a good heart who isn’t a bad ass and really doesn’t want to hurt anyone even as he frequently finds himself in violent situations. Shaw does an equally good job at portraying the rural lifestyle and the oddball characters you might find there. I come from farm country so I’ve known more than a few people exactly like Jimmy’s buddies in my life. Just as Shaw presents them you’ll never have a more loyal friend who can nearly get you killed in ways you can’t imagine, and they’ll usually have a beer in their hand while it happens.
Fans of Joe R. Lansdale’s Hap & Leonard series should definitely give these books a try because they share a lot of the same DNA, but Shaw has got his own style and rhythm that’s he’s pretty much honed to perfection at this point. This was just pure madcap fun to read.
Full Disclosure – I once contributed an unpaid review to the Shaw’s Blood & Tacos e-zine....more
I received a free copy from the publisher for review.
This is a good time to be a fan of Hap & Leonard with the new novel Honky Tonk Samurai being releI received a free copy from the publisher for review.
This is a good time to be a fan of Hap & Leonard with the new novel Honky Tonk Samurai being released and a TV series based on their adventures about to premiere. As a fan who has been reading H&L since the late ‘90s I have to admit to feeling a bit conflicted about all this attention. I’m glad to see Joe R. Lansdale and his creations getting their due, but I’ve also got that same kind of scornful streak that makes hipsters such a delight when they sneer at any band that more than a dozen people have heard of.
“Oh, really? You started reading Hap & Leonard? Just downloaded all their books on your e-reader this morning, did you? How nice. Of course, they were better LAST CENTURY which is when I discovered their early books in a soggy cardboard box in the basement of a used book store….”
If you don’t know about Hap & Leonard already then suffice it to say that they’re a couple of best friends living in east Texas who have an uncanny ability to put themselves in bad situations that usually require a whole lot of ass whippings and some gunfire to get out of. They’re profane and politically incorrect but don’t think that they’re your standard good old boys. Hap is a former hippie whose bleeding heart is frequently the cause of their problems while Leonard is a Vietnam veteran who is proud to be black and gay, and his favorite hobby is burning down crack houses. In the hands of Lansdale the adventures of H&L are often hilarious and frequently gross, and yet there’s a surprising amount of depth at times about the real cost of violence as well as a profound sense of melancholy that the narrator Hap has as he reflects on his life and other matters.
Even as I look down my nose at you late comers I have to admit that this collection put together to capitalize on the TV show has a lot of stuff that I haven’t read. There’s two novellas, four short stories, an ‘interview’ with the author questioning the guys, and Lansdale also wrote a brief summary of his history writing the series as an extended afterwards. Michael Koryta also provides a nice introduction.
While I’d previously read the novella Hyenas and the short story that came with it, The Boy Who Became Invisible, all the rest of this was new to me so even as a long time H&L fan I found plenty of value here. (I’d never read the other novella, Dead Aim, because I refused to pay the outrageous hardback price for it at the time although it’s since become available at a much more reasonable cost as an e-book.) I was particularly delighted to finally read the short story Veil’s Visit which is a collaboration with Andrew Vachss who is also the inspiration for the character of Veil, a lawyer who you don’t want to meet in or out of court.
If you’re someone who hasn’t read Hap & Leonard, and you’re curious then this could make for a good starting point because it is a nice variety pack that gives you a taste of what they’re all about. For those who have read some of the series then it’s a question of how much is new material to you. If you’ve read the novellas already then it may seem a bit thin, but it’d be a good buy for H&L fans who haven’t.
Update 2/23/16: It was just brought to my attention that there's an e-version of this called Hap and Leonard Ride Again which apparently has the same material with a few additional short stories....more
Poor John Dortmunder has such bad luck that things go sideways for him even when he’s stealing from a guy who is helping him do it.
After Dortmunder gePoor John Dortmunder has such bad luck that things go sideways for him even when he’s stealing from a guy who is helping him do it.
After Dortmunder gets caught in the act of stealing TVs out of a repair shop he seems certain to be heading back to prison for a long stay, but a high-priced defense attorney suddenly shows up and does the kind of court room magic that keeps guys like Robert Durst running around loose for years. It turns out that the lawyer has been looking for a thief who met a certain kind of criteria to pull a job for another client of his, Chauncey. Dortmunder meets Chauncey, a wealthy man who is short of cash in only the way that the rich can be while still being rich, and Chauncey has an idea for them both to make some money.
The plan is that Dortmunder will steal a valuable painting as well as some other goodies when Chauncey has a house full of wealthy friends around. Dortmunder holds the painting for collateral until Chauncey collects the insurance, and he’ll pay Dortmunder a healthy portion of the settlement. Then Dortmunder will return the painting to Chauncey who will hide it away where he can still appreciate it. And just to make sure that Dortmunder doesn’t try anything cute like try to sell the painting for himself, Chauncey has also hired a hit man who has instructions to kill Dortmunder if the painting isn’t returned to him.
Dortmunder isn’t thrilled with the hit man angle, but since he isn’t planning on doing any double crosses he doesn’t sweat it much as he puts together his usual crew of misfits to pull off a heist that will look legit to the insurance company. As usual in a Dortmunder caper, there are some complications that arise that make the threat of the hitman suddenly become a lot more hazardous.
I never fail to be amazed when reading the funny misadventures of Dortmunder that they’re written by the same guy who also created the ultimate humorless anti-hero in the very serious Parker series under the Richard Stark pen name. It shows how versatile Westlake was that he could create two series that are both about professional thieves and yet make them so completely different.
While I prefer the hard-boiled stories of Parker’s heists, I also quite enjoy the Dortmunder stories. There’s nothing knee-slapping hilarious in these books although they often turn into outright farces, but there’s a certain slyness to Westlake’s wit that I find very appealing. There’s also a kind of low-key charm to the gloomy Dortmunder and his buddies, and it’s always fun to see what kind of trouble they’re getting into.
This one is a little odd in that it ends in a kind of open ended way that really leaves a lot of loose threads hanging out there. These aren't the kind of books where everything needs to be wrapped in neatly to be satisfying, but Westlake usually did a better job of resolving Dortmunder’s problems. This one seems like he couldn’t really figure a way out so he just ended it on a joke instead, and that’s slightly disappointing. ...more
Apparently there’s a lost episode of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia that was titled The Gang Gets A Book Deal.
Fans of the show might be slightly coApparently there’s a lost episode of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia that was titled The Gang Gets A Book Deal.
Fans of the show might be slightly confused as to how these selfish, delusional, scheming, amoral, profane, drunken misfits with an uncanny ability to wreck the lives of anyone they encounter have managed to write a book, let alone get it published. (Hell, Charlie can’t even read!) The fact that it’s supposed to be a self-help book makes it even more mind boggling considering that the most important thing this pack of jackals has ever accomplished with their miserable lives is managing to somehow stay out of jail.
The introduction from a former editor of Harper Collins sets the stage that one of their employees with a substance abuse problem found his way to Paddy’s Pub and after a blackout drunk signed The Gang to an ill-advised deal. They, of course, instantly see this as being an easy way to wind up as famous authors who will be on the best seller list in no time. However, it should come as no surprise to regular viewers that things start going off the rails when they realize they’re actually going to have to sit their beers down long enough to write the goddamn thing.
The book uses the idea of each character is writing different sections to do a hilarious job of capturing the voice and tone of everyone. So we get details on Mac’s delusions of being bad ass, Dennis’ narcissism, Frank’s various perversions, Sweet Dee’s neurotic insecurities, and Charlie’s deranged worldview. It’s very funny and more than a little terrifying to spend time in the minds of these people. The running gag that The Gang is getting increasingly frustrated with writing the book and the exasperated notes from the editors that show how much money and time they’re costing the publisher also provides some of the book’s best bits.
However, it does rely a bit too much on calling back to incidents and jokes from the show. Any tie-in book like this is going to lean on the history, but when it’s done really well, like say How to Archer, it seems like a continuation of the show and not just references. When there are things like a whole chapter based on Dennis getting shushed one time it feels a little too much like a call back rather than building on what's come before.
Still it’s a pretty funny companion piece to the show. It probably won’t mean much to anyone who isn't a hard core fan, but if you aren't a hard core fan, then why would you read the book? Any member of The Gang would tell you that you’re just an idiot if you did that. ...more
Do you want to hear Walter White curse at a child? (And who wouldn’t?) Then you can download this from Audible for free now and listen to Bryan CranstDo you want to hear Walter White curse at a child? (And who wouldn’t?) Then you can download this from Audible for free now and listen to Bryan Cranston profanely urge a youngster to eat something just as Samuel L. Jackson once begged another kid to Go the Fuck to Sleep. It’s as funny as you’d expect it to be. ...more
(I received a free advance copy of this via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.)
Comedian and actor Patton Oswalt wrote this unflinching accoun(I received a free advance copy of this via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.)
Comedian and actor Patton Oswalt wrote this unflinching account of his battle with addiction during the late ‘90s, but he didn’t spend his days cooking meth with bikers or whoring himself out for crack. Poor Patton was a movie junkie who found plenty of dealers to get him high in the theaters of Los Angeles.
A double feature of Billy Wilder films at the New Beverly Cinema was the gateway drug that led Patton down a relentless path of devouring movies and cataloging them in a diary as well as notations in several film books he had. His work and his relationships suffered as he became unable to relate to other people’s every day interests that didn't involve movies, and he rationalized his behavior by thinking that it would eventually give him the insight to make a great film of his own. His descent continued until he hits bottom shortly after seeing Star Wars: The Phantom Menace. Which is understandable because a lot of us never felt like seeing a movie again after that one.
Ah, but seriously folks…
I noted in my review of Oswalt’s Zombie Spaceship Wasteland that I found the darker elements of that memoir intriguing, but that he’d seemed a little scared of making it too personal and sincere so he’d inserted segments of pure humor in it as deflections. Here we have him recounting a period when he feels like he let his love of movies of get the better of him, and how coming to terms with that changed the way he approached his own career as well as what was really important to him as a person. Since this is a professional comedian telling the story, it’s still funny, but it doesn’t seem like he’s using humor as a shield like it did in his previous book.
Here’s the tricky part for me about reviewing this: I’m a Patton Oswalt fan who finds him not only hilarious but also an actor capable of great work in both TV and film. I love reading about what creative people think about the process of actually turning ideas into something that can be shared. I’ll also confess to being a movie junkie. While I’ve never chased the dragon as hard as Patton did, I am the kind of person who is perfectly happy to kill an afternoon at a special showing of Seven Samurai or spend the better part of a day in a Marvel movie marathon. When Patton tells a story about seeing Last Man Standing and subjecting the friend he was with to the whole history of how it’s actually the same story as A Fistful of Dollars which is pretty much a remake of Kurosawa’s Yojimbo which was heavily influenced by Dashiell Hammet’s Red Harvest, it made me cringe because I said the same exact thing to the person I saw it with, too.
So this book obviously hit a sweet spot for me, but I could see another reader (Someone who doesn’t have their own custom I HATE! I HATE! coffee mug based on Oswalt’s Text routine.) maybe not liking this book quite so much. Such a person might point out that Patton is essentially berating his younger self for the time spent on his movie obsession rather than creating his own work as well as lamenting the time he didn’t spend with friends and family. And they’d have a valid point.
Because for all his self-criticism here it’s a little odd that Patton doesn’t give himself more credit for what he was accomplishing at the time which was turning himself into a top-notch comedian by performing relentlessly as well as landing regular work in the movies and on TV. Yeah, maybe he was on King of Queens for years instead of making his own Citizen Kane, but that helped him get to a point where he’s got to do other things like his great and disturbing performance as a sports nut in Big Fan. And now he’s married and has a daughter that he loves dearly so he figured out that whole work/life balance thing, right?
So what exactly is this guy bitching about? That he wasted a lot of time in the ‘90s watching movies? Hell, we all did that.
However, it the book works for you, then you‘ll find a lot more than that. It’s hard to break down the stew of events and small epiphanies that make us who we are, and that’s what Patton has tried to do here. He’s describing a period when he wasn't satisfied with what he was doing and was flailing around for answers by immersing himself obsessively in something he loved. He did finally learn something from all his time watching movies, but it wasn't what he went looking for. Maybe he didn’t become Quentin Tarantino, but he did grow into being Patton Oswalt. And like a lot of his fans, I’m happy it worked out that way.
Hey, I just got an email from Alamo Drafthouse telling me that they’re having a screening of The Apartment this weekend. Maybe I should check that out....
Treasure of the Rubbermaids 22 : You Call This A Crossover?
The on-going discoveries of priceless books and comics found in a stack of Rubbermaid contaTreasure of the Rubbermaids 22 : You Call This A Crossover?
The on-going discoveries of priceless books and comics found in a stack of Rubbermaid containers previously stored and forgotten at my parent’s house and untouched for almost 20 years. Thanks to my father dumping them back on me, I now spend my spare time unearthing lost treasures from their plastic depths.
I’ve recently been engaged in a project to catalog all the comics I bought in my youth as well as putting them in new bags with fresh boards.* Going through this has brought to light many forgotten items, and it’s also reminded me of several trends like back in the ‘90s Marvel loved to put the Punisher in different comic books. This takes that concept to the extreme.
Archie Comics and Marvel teamed up to have everyone’s favorite murderous vigilante meet everyone’s favorite perpetual high school student. The Punisher is tracking a criminal named Red who fled to Riverdale, and he bears a striking resemblance to Archie. Hilarity ensues. Sort of. I guess. If you think Archie comics are funny.
The key thing here is that this is The Punisher Meets Archie, not The Punisher KILLS Archie although I guess Archie recently met his end. It’s pretty obvious that the terms of the deal for Archie Comics must have stressed that nobody could actually die in this book because Frank Castle is working for the government with a promise that he’ll bring in Red alive. (view spoiler)[Although, I guess that’s a little unclear at the end. Did the government send helicopters to retrieve Red as the Punisher said they would? (hide spoiler)] So overall the Punisher is just a big mean guy who waves guns around and scares everybody.
Since there’s no teeth to him, the joke is all about the Punisher being the fish out of water in Riverdale although a modest attempt is made to introduce a little angst with Castle getting misty eyed over the small town innocence of everyone and thinking of what might have been if only his family hadn’t been massacred by those dastardly gangsters. But we’re pretty much operating by the Archie standard here so there’s nothing done with the idea that delivering a typical Punisher amount of ultra-violence to Riverdale could be funny if done right. So the whole book is leaning on the notion that putting Archie and the Punisher together is inherently funny. It’s not.
Pretty disappointing overall. If you want to see a really interesting dark version of Archie than try the Criminal, Vol. 6: The Last of the Innocent which does a lot more with the whole concept even if they couldn’t call the characters by name.
This review is dedicated to Jeff who added this to his to-read list shortly after I came across it and inspired me to crack it open.
* I had heard that you are supposed to rebag your comics periodically but thought it was a sinister conspiracy started to sell more bags and boards. However, going through these that have been in plastic since the early ‘90s has shown me that it’s a pretty good idea. Many of the bags had yellowed and a lot of the boards were showing imprints from the back cover. I assume this can’t be good for the comics. ...more
As you‘d expect from something with a title like this, I found a lot of it funny, but I think my biggest laugh came when I looked at the summary here As you‘d expect from something with a title like this, I found a lot of it funny, but I think my biggest laugh came when I looked at the summary here on Goodreads and saw this:
This 5000 word erotic story is for mature audiences only. It contains adult material and explicit scenes of sex. All characters engaged in sexual acts are over 18.
As if some skeevy producer was there checking driver’s licenses on the monsters before shooting an actual porno. "Hey, I think Gomera is only 16. Make sure that ID isn’t fake.”
I am not a connoisseur of the monster porn. For that you’d have to go to someone who is a scholar of the genre like karen. In fact, I only downloaded and read this to work off a shame debt I owed to Amanda for the infamous Sea Cock incident.
So safe to say that I wasn’t expecting much for my 99 cents, but it actually had a clarity of purpose that I admired. You say you want to read about a giant woman fucking monsters? Meet Nancy who got turned into a 50 foot tall behemoth via unexplained and unimportant circumstances. Her enormous size has awakened a voracious sexual appetite that masturbating in a lab in front of pervy scientists won’t satisfy so she’s off to a monster island to get her some action off those gargantuan beasts like Godzilla that she’s seen on the Discovery Channel.
It was also much funnier than I was expecting. I was prepared for it to be sophomoric with plenty of graphic sex, and while it certainly delivers on the graphic sex aspect, it’s also got a sly sense of subversive humor to it. When Nancy snaps and uses one of her captors as an impromptu dildo it’s like a scene from an episode of South Park.
So I had some good chuckles with it, but I’m just not the kind of guy who gets his jollies reading about some enormous woman repeatedly masturbating and doing it with monsters. I’ve got more important things to do like checking out the X-Men: Days of Future Past trailer again to gawp at Jennifer Lawrence in that blue body paint….. What? You clicked on a review for a book called Debbie Does Monsterland so you’re not exactly in a position to judge, are you?...more
I’ve read a lot of books featuring drunk detectives in my time and it’s not like I haven’t occasionally occupied a bar stool myself, but I needed a liI’ve read a lot of books featuring drunk detectives in my time and it’s not like I haven’t occasionally occupied a bar stool myself, but I needed a liver transplant by the time I finished this one.
Private investigator detective Nick Valentine is asked to consult at the crime scene of an apparent suicide by his old boss, the police chief of St. Louis. Nick sets the tone for the rest of the book when he arrives with a glass of gin and snorts some oxy before going inside to talk to the cops. However, he’s still lucid enough to determine the suicide has been staged before returning to the office he lives in with his small dog, Frank Sinatra.
When the robbery of a credit union by a couple of lowlifes goes sideways, it leaves a bag of money up for grabs for every hustler in town. The police chief again asks Nick to help because of his extensive contacts in the criminal underworld in town. Nick responds by going to a strip club to see somebody and consumes the following in about 15 minutes:
2 Coronas 2 shots Crown Royal 1 Scotch 1 shot Yukon Jack 1 shot Wild Turkey 1 line of cocaine
Then he drives home to really start drinking.
Nick barely finds time to interact with other characters, generally managing just a few minutes of conversation before gulping down enough booze to kill a rhinoceros. There’s a colorful cast around him with a straight arrow police detective who grew up Amish, a couple of thugs who bet on which of them can cut the limb off someone most cleanly with an axe, a professional thief who would literally take the watch off a corpse at a funeral and an unattractive coke addict who can’t nail a stripper no matter how much money he throws at them.
Since most of what we see of Nick early on revolves around him trying to get his next drink, we don’t get a handle of him until late in the book. Is he really making a deal with a couple of people to find the money and keep it for themselves, or is he playing some kind of Sam Spade like angle in which he’s kinda sorta pretending to be crooked to solve the crime for the chief? Does Nick even know himself?
This is fun crime story that delights in its own violence and over the top behavior of its protagonist and the characters around him. It’s not for the faint hearted, but if you like your detectives drunk and your criminals stupid, this is one you should try out. ...more
Some might think that William Shakespeare and Edgar Allan Poe would be rolling in their graves at the way Christopher Moore has used their works, but Some might think that William Shakespeare and Edgar Allan Poe would be rolling in their graves at the way Christopher Moore has used their works, but it’s just as likely that they’d be laughing their asses off.
Moore has (In his own words.) ‘stitched together an abomination’ out of The Merchant of Venice, Othello and The Cask of Amontillado using the character of Pocket as the thread. Pocket was the hero of Moore’s last Shakespeare spoof Fool, and while he may be a Fool by training and inclination, that doesn’t mean that he’s not smart enough to get some well-deserved revenge when he gets caught up in a sinister plot in Venice involving a trio of conspirators. While the merchant Antonio, the senator Brabantio and the soldier Iago are powerful enemies, Pocket has an ally in the mighty general Othello as well as being a friend to the Jewish money lender Shylock and his daughter Jessica. Oh, and since this is a Christopher Moore novel there’s some kind of mysterious creature lurking in the canals of Venice….
There was a lot to like about this one, and as you’d expect with a Moore book, there’s plenty of laughs of a bawdy nature as well as genuine cleverness at how he integrated the three classic works of literature together. Pocket remains one of his best characters in the way that he uses his smart mouth and a sneaky nature to make up for a his lack of size.
The one complaint I’ve got is similar to the one that left me dissatisfied with Moore’s last book Sacre Bleu, and it’s the way he incorporates flashbacks. As with Sacre Bleu he starts mid-plot and doles out the history in bits and pieces throughout the book, and it can be confusing at times. For example, this book begins with Brobantio, Antonio and Iago waiting on a dock for the arrival of Pocket so they can take revenge for him. Why are the characters from two different plays working together? Why do they want revenge on Pocket? Why does he act so contemptuous of them when he arrives? You only find that out later, and it had me scratching my head so much that I actually stopped to check and see if I had missed another book featuring the Fool.
That flashback mechanism can work well when trying to build mystery or suspense, but it’s more than a little confusing when you’re already trying to establish a story that blends three works together using characters from a spoof of another play. Moore probably wanted to get right into the meat of the story, but this is the kind of thing where some time spent establishing the ground rules would make things flow better. It didn’t bother me as badly as it did in Sacre Bleu, but it was a distraction.
Still, if you want to read a tale of ‘Heinous Fuckery, most foul’ and laugh a lot while doing so, this is the book for you....more
“Ceja Carneros hit me so hard he broke his watch on my head.”
And with that opening line the second Jimmy Veeder Fiasco begins. In Dove Season Jimmy re“Ceja Carneros hit me so hard he broke his watch on my head.”
And with that opening line the second Jimmy Veeder Fiasco begins. In Dove Season Jimmy returned to his childhood home in the desert country of Imperial Valley in California after years of doing his best avoid any and all responsibility. Now he’s a farmer living with his girlfriend and raising a small boy, but Jimmy can’t entirely give up his old ways. Whenever his best friend Bobby Maves decides it time for drunken adventure Jimmy is his first call to join him on Mavescapades that usually involve physical injuries as well as hangovers. Since Bobby recently broke up with his girlfriend the late nights have been a lot more frequent lately.
Then Bobby gets word that his estranged sixteen year daughter has disappeared from her home in a neighboring city, and Jimmy feels obligated to help his friend track the girl down. Since Bobby fully believes that anything less than kicking in doors, knocking heads, and demanding answers is a completely unacceptable they soon find themselves embroiled in a series of confrontations that are both extremely violent and pretty funny.
Johnny Shaw hit my radar in a big way a couple years back with Dove Season, Big Maria and the quarterly e-magazine Blood & Tacos*, and Plaster City continues to show what makes him such a fun read. It's fast, violent, funny, and entertaining, and Jimmy’s second adventure is as good as the first. The emotional weight this time comes from Jimmy’s conflict between wanting to be a responsible person that his girlfriend and son can depend on, and his desire to be a loyal friend to the reckless Bobby.
A big part of the appeal is that Jimmy isn’t your typical crime novel protagonist. He’s not a bad ass and is well aware that he’s in way over his head. Jimmy’s also a genuinely nice guy who doesn’t want to hurt anyone. Yet he feels duty bound to stick by Bobby even as his macho redneck insistence on doing things with fists and guns repeatedly puts both of them in danger. As they cross paths with a Mexican biker gang and another childhood friend who has become a dangerous criminal kingpin the tension between Jimmy’s family life and his friend increases to the breaking point.
Anyone who likes a fast paced story populated by colorful characters in which the violence is doled out with both humor and an appreciation of the consequences should be reading Johnny Shaw.
*(Full disclosure. I contributed an unpaid review to an issue of Blood & Tacos.)
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