• The Red Dahlia by Lynda La Plante
• Map of Bones by James Rollins
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Comic) Issue 2
• Marvel 1602 (Trade Paperback)
• Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art by Scott McCloud
• The Know-It-All by A.J. Jacobs

Quick reviews:

– The Red Dahlia by Lynda La Plante
This one was lent to me by my co-worker Bridget right before we left on the trip. It’s a pretty straightforward crime thriller and I plowed through it, finishing just before we landed in America. I found the resolution a little surprising, mostly because I was expecting more of a twist. I also thought that the characters got remarkably dumb at the end; I knew where the villain was waaaay before they figured it out. Still, it was a relatively entertaining page turner.

– Map of Bones by James Rollins
My Dad’s wife Cindy lent me this one to read on the flight to Orlando. It’s basically a Da Vinci Code knockoff, with a bunch of secret agents running around Europe trying to defeat an ancient society of alchemists. I couldn’t even name a single character at this point, so they must have all been pretty forgettable. Mostly I was hooked because the initial murder takes place in the Cathedral in Cologne, Germany, where I’ve actually been. But I’d only recommend this one if you’re a big Dan Brown fan.

– Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Comic) Issue 2
Yay! Picked this one up at a comic book store in Evanston, Illinois. Giles! Willow! I’m a big fan.

– Marvel 1602 (Trade Paperback)
I actually found this one at Target in Goshen, Indiana. I hadn’t heard of it before, but the idea of Neil Gaiman setting superheroes in Elizabethan England was too cool to pass up. I really liked it! Luckily I’ve been exposed to enough of the Marvel universe now to recognize most of the characters. I especially liked meeting the Fantastic Four, since I haven’t really read any of their stuff yet. (It took me, like, ten minutes to get what had happened when the glass thing in Doom’s bedroom breaks and “someone” calls Natasha a whore. That ruled.) So overall, I’d give this one a big thumbs-up to newbie fans like me who are still wary of jumping into the current comics chronology.

– Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art by Scott McCloud
This was awesome. I picked it up on a whim at a bookshop in O’Hare and I just devoured it. I remember at one point actually feeling like a lightbulb had gone off over my head as McCloud perfectly illustrated how and why comics work. It reminded me of a lot of my film studies in college, but it’s written in such a way as to be accessible to everybody. Now I’d just like to find something similar that talks about the history of comics, especially as pertains to the 20th century. Any recommendations?

– The Know-It-All by A.J. Jacobs
I actually haven’t quite finished this one yet. I picked it up at LAX and I’m about 2/3 of the way through. It’s about one guy’s random obsession with reading the entire Encyclopedia Britannica. I’m enjoying it in much the same way I enjoy Bill Bryson’s work. It indulges in my love of pointless trivia and knowledge while occasionally making me laugh out loud. So far, so good!

Books I’ve Finished Recently:

– March by Geraldine Brooks. This one came highly recommended – both by Mary-Helen and the folks at Kinokuniya – but I have to say I’m a little conflicted about it. On one hand I think it’s a great story, well-told and engaging, and the author’s conceit of filling in the missing “grown-up” parts of Little Women is cleverly executed. (Almost too cleverly; I found myself ticking off each expected plot point as it occurred: the parents’ courtship, the Marches’ lost fortune, Marmee’s temper, Aunt March’s feud, etc.) Brooks is unflinching in her portrayal of the Civil War and the moral conflicts faced by those abolitionists who took up arms. Yeah, I wept when I read the message on the silk scarf, and I was surprised at how the happy ending of LW was changed into something completely different here. But for all its good points… it’s fan fiction. Really good fanfic, but fanfic nonetheless. I kept thinking back to the horrible The Wind Done Gone and the salacious Mr. Darcy Takes a Wife (especially with all the unexpected sex). *shudder* Are they really giving out Pulitzer Prizes for exceptional achievements in fan fiction now? Because the Harry Potter slashfic geeks will be ALL OVER THIS.

– Comet in Moominland by Tove Jansson. Yeah, Snookums has already read this one to me as a bedtime story, but I fall asleep and I miss parts. It was nice to go back and fill in the gaps. Man, I just can’t get enough of Sniff! He’s definitely my favorite character (followed closely by the Hemulen). “Five horrible experiences. It’s beginning to be monotonous!” I like how Sniff is always screaming and running after shiny things.

– Batman: Hush by Jeph Loeb. I absolutely love the look of this book. This is what comic books should look like. That said, the story was a bit hard for me to get my head around. I can tell from the way it’s structured that many of the cameos, in-jokes, and references were gifts for the hardcore fans (who no doubt loved them), but with my limited knowledge of Batman canon most of them went right over my head. (For example, I’d never heard of Clayface before so his appearance was really confusing for a while.) But man, the look of it! Great hulking heroes and ass-kicking voluptuous babes… It was worth it just for the visuals. (And for Supes getting his butt kicked. That’s always a bonus.)

– Ultimate Spider-Man (Volume 1) by Brian Michael Bendis. Meh. I didn’t love this one so much. The vivid cartoony style just doesn’t appeal to me a lot. Is this the way Spidey has always looked? So gangly and Disneyfied? I know it’s just the origin story, but right now it reads like Spider-Man meets Saved by the Bell. Maybe I just prefer darker stories…

– Y: The Last Man (Volume 1) by Brian K. Vaughan. Like this one! A mystery plague wipes out every male on the planet except for one guy and his pet monkey. And oh yeah, his Mom’s a Congresswoman and this girlfriend’s somewhere in Australia. The artwork is okay – not visually arresting like Hush, but not too distracting to the narrative like Ultimate Spider-Man. (It took me a little while to work out that 355 is actually female.) The writing is awesome, really well done. (I like it when comic book characters swear.) I was wary that the concept would get boring and cheesy, but I got sucked into the story really quickly. And the violence! Those crazy Amazons, cuttin’ their own boobs off. I can’t wait to see where they go with this…

Awhile back I joined the Kinokuniya loyalty club, and today I found an e-mail in my Inbox with a couple 20% off coupons. That’s as good an excuse as any to go book shopping! I’ve been wanting to read March by Geraldine Brooks ever since Mary-Helen recommended it so I picked up a copy (one of their last!) as well as a new copy of Little Women. I’ve read LW several times before (and I’m sure it’s sitting in my Mom’s basement somewhere) but I figured I ought to read it again before I tackle March. I also put in an order for Jeffrey Steingarten‘s The Man Who Ate Everything (since it’s always out of stock). Then I moseyed on over to the comics section – I love the looks on the geek guys’ faces – where I was excited to see that Batman: The Dark Knight Returns was finally available. I’ve always liked Batman, and I’m trying to hit some of the big high points in the comics canon. (Did I mention I read The Watchmen? That’s a whole ‘nother post, really…) So that’s three new books to add to the pile on my bedside table. I’m currently about halfway through Peter Carey’s The True History of the Kelly Gang, and so far I’m really enjoying it. (Ned Kelly was sorta the Australian equivalent of Jesse James.) Yay! The only thing that makes chilly winter nights bearable is a warm husband, a thick duvet, and a stack of new books…

I finally managed to finish “Eragon”. While my initial impression of the book didn’t change much, I’d admit it did get better towards the end. I still think the publishers were a little hasty putting this out. The writing style was juvenile and the plot “homages” were altogether too obvious. (I started humming the James Bond theme as soon as they got to the giant hollowed-out volcano.) I also got annoyed when the “revenge quest” plot that occupied most of the book was suddenly dropped (quite unresolved) in favor of “rescue the princess”. Characters would fail to anticipate plot twists that I could see coming miles away. (For instance, I’ll bet you dollars to doughnuts that we find out in the next book that the “twins” are double-agents and set up Eragon to get killed by the Shade.) And how many times in one book can you end a chapter with the main character getting knocked out? Eragon winds up unconscious more often than Giles.

So overall, I wouldn’t recommend this one for the adult fantasy fan. It’s just too boring, too derivative, and too predictable.

When I was 15, I read The Hero and the Crown by Robin McKinley. I absolutely loved it. It was a fantasy with a princess and a dragon and magicians and secrets and I wished more than anything that I had written it. So I spent, like, a week plotting my own fantasy and inventing characters. There was a princess… and a dragon… and some magicians… You see where this is going. Eventually I realized that all I was doing was rewriting McKinley with different names. It wasn’t original and it wasn’t interesting. I decided imitation wasn’t the sincerest form of flattery and gave up the effort.

Christopher Paolini didn’t. He’s a weird home-schooled teenager “genius” who’s written this year’s pseudo-Harry Potter book of choice (according to the publishing industry, anyway). It’s called Eragon. It’s been getting a fair bit of hype so I picked up a copy last weekend. I regretted it as soon as I got home. There’s a gushing quote from Anne McCaffrey on the back! (I’ve never been able to get through a single Dragonriders of Pern book so her recommendation doesn’t exactly carry a lot of weight with me.)

It only got worse once I cracked it open. The first problem is the kid’s writing style. You can read some for yourself here. He actually says: “In my writing, I strive for a lyrical beauty somewhere between Tolkien at his best and Seamus Heaney’s translation of Beowulf.” *snort* In practice, as far as I can tell this involves using lots of adjectives. Mountains are “forbiddingly solemn”, forests are “thickly treacherous”, and the danger is always “intensely palpable”. Once you get past the affected style, the story itself isn’t that bad… as long as you don’t mind rolling your eyes at the obvious influences. It’s like he put the Pern books, a complete set of Lord of the Rings, a dog-eared copy of Beowulf, and the shooting script of Star Wars into a blender and this is what popped out. He even prefaces the book with a map that might as well be Middle Earth. The story is full of elves, monsters, dwarves, men, dragons, men who ride dragons, etc. There’s no humour and no originality, other than in the combining of all these things. I keep waiting for hobbits to show up.

Am I being too harsh? I’m only halfway through, so maybe it gets better towards the end. Right now I’m just plugging along out of curiosity and duty. I dunno, maybe I’m just jealous that nobody ever offered to publish my derivative crap. At any rate, I can’t exactly recommend this one to the Potter fans yet.