Archive for the 'Book Review' Category
March 25th, 2010 by Jim Davenport
I received this book (Lamb by Christopher Moore) at a church “bring one, take one” book exchange. A friend of mine snapped it up and pushed it into my hand. I’m glad he did.
This is my first taste of Christopher Moore’s sense of humor and I’m enjoying it quite a bit. He’s got a great mixture of character attitudes relevant to the time of the story layered with sarcasm and snarky wit of a modern mind. (Okay, sure, I know I’m being ‘age-you’re-living-in-now’-ist, but they haven’t outlawed that yet.)
The concept is that a Jew named Levi (nicknamed Biff for the sound it made when his mother had to whack him upside the head) was Jesus’ (known in the book as Joshua rather than the Greek Jesus) best friend as a kid and all his life. With humor, it mines the story from when they are about 8 years old onward, encountering angels, Mary Magdalene, John the Baptist, but also filling in the gap of the first ~30 years of Jesus’ life. In the story, “Joshua” and Biff travel to find the three Magi who came to see Joshua’s birth. Their travels take them across Mesopotamia, into Afghanistan and down into India. Woven into the travels are the ways Joshua is educated or exposed to the many religions and other influences which some might say helped to define “New Testament Christianity”. I happen to think that makes 100% sense, but I’ll leave religious debates aside.
So while the book is irreverent, it is also true to the characters. Joshua struggles with knowing that he’s the Son of God but being unable to tell the world about it. He knows he’s different than anyone else in the world and it makes him very lonely at times. Biff acts as a sort of comic relief, but also a stalwart and true friend as well as an honest man to help the Messiah on his journeys.
I’m definitely going to try some of Christopher Moore’s many other titles. With luck, I’ve found another author to help feed my humorous book addiction while waiting for the next Discworld novel from Terry Pratchett (Lord, let him live to 150 years old…)
December 16th, 2009 by Jim Davenport
After writing one of my Gaming the Movies columns on the TV Show Burn Notice, I had to try out the Burn Notice novels. I took advantage of the discount you get in the DVD set of Season 2 of the show and ordered The Fix and The End Game. The Fix came out first so I’m starting with that.
The author, Tod Goldberg, has done a very good job of capturing the voices of Michael, Sam, Fiona, Madeline, etc. as well as the pace and content of a Burn Notice episode. You get a little bit more background on them here and there but nothing that couldn’t have popped up as an aside in a future episode. Some of Michael’s comments to the viewers are more lengthy than a TV show would allow, but all in all, the feel is remarkably similar.
So if you’re looking to the novels to be different or more or better than the show, they won’t be that. You won’t see characters change much if at all, which is a hallmark of most long-running stylish TV series. You expect Michael to be snarky, Fiona to be hot-tempered, and Sam to be, well, let’s just say Sam.
If you just need your fix for new Burn Notice stuff before new episodes air, I think the Fix does just fine.
November 1st, 2009 by Jim Davenport
Third in my series of Superhero books takes a look at a collection of short stories edited by Owen King and John McNally (both of whom have entries in the book). The book is divided thematically into:
- The Most Unlikely Beginnings
- The Beast Within
- A Shadowy Figure
- Behind the Mask
- Super Ordinary
I found all the story concepts to be quite original but they were uneven in quality of execution. One story, the Somewhat Super by David Yoo, stood out in my mind with a neat setup, good characterization, and an ending that made me go “Wow!”. I’ll leave that one for you to discover, but give you a taste of some others.
Man Oh Man – It’s Manna Man by George Singleton tells us about someone who discovered that he could reach through the television set and put words into the mouths of the people speaking there. In order to do good works, he focuses on forcing corrupt televangelists to call for money to be sent to places, people, and organizations in true need.
The Thirteenth Egg by Scott Snyder looks back to the atomic bomb experiments after World War 2 and the man infused with all that energy. The real story is what happens when he gets home, discharged from the service without any guidance and little control of his power. What happens to him as he tries to adjust to life as a civilian again.
The Rememberer by J. Robert Lennon examines a life where nothing is forgotten, ever. How can it be of use? How vital is the ability to forget for our sanity?
This anthology is labelled as “No. 1″ so I hope they keep trying. There was enough intriguing ideas and deft writing to make it worth the read.
November 1st, 2009 by Jim Davenport
Time for another book review! We’re continuing our look at Superhero Novels with Playing for Keeps by Mur Lafferty. (Full Disclosure: Ms. Lafferty is a columnist for the Knights of the Dinner Table magazine where I am also a columnist).
“The supervillain attacked at the most inconvenient place and time: right on Keepsie’s walk to work. She looked into the sky at the costumed combatants and groaned.
‘Why did they have to do this on a Thursday?’ ”
Those opening lines quickly set the tone of the book. Powers exist, superheroes battle supervillains, and the rest of us still have to worry about paying the bills. In her version of the world, superheroes were created in waves. The First Wavers are classic superheroes with great powers. Our heroes? The Third Wavers with powers like the ability to hold a serving tray and never spill a beer, or to heal you… a little bit. They gather in a bar, a haven belonging to Keepsie, and complain about the arrogance of the heroes.
The book builds quickly using the familiar trope of ‘useless’ powers that slowly become more useful through creative thinking. Lafferty does it well without telegraphing it early. The tension rises as the problems at hand get bigger and bigger. Our heroes refuse to cave in to heroes or villains and become key to the battle of the day.
Lafferty’s sense of humor is subtle and keeps the book from becoming an outright parody of the genre. The heroes and villains are very creative and the powers would be very interesting to try to model in an RPG.
I’d recommend the book as an amusing read with a lot of original ideas. I hope Ms. Lafferty is writing another already.
October 2nd, 2009 by Jim Davenport
Hi, my name is Jim and I’m a superhero-themed novel junkie…
(Chorus) Hi Jim!
I’ll admit it. I like superhero comics and I like superhero novels. I’m drawn to comics that have a tinge or more of reality. I liked the deconstructionist stuff of the 1980s and 1990s. Watchman is a great graphic novel and while I enjoy the superheroics of Batman, it’s when he struggles with the strange position being Batman puts him in. Perhaps that’s why I’m drawn mostly to the Marvel characters: Spiderman and Daredevil in their solo titles in particular. A good mix of harsh reality and the freedom of having superpowers.
Anyway, I came across Superpowers by David J. Schwartz a few months ago while trawling for superhero-related titles in Amazon. There were some reviews about it being too soap-opera-y though most were favorable. It was worth a shot.
The story centers around five people loosely connected as room-mates or friends who inexplicably develop superpowers over night. Each of the five gains one power: speed, strength, mind-reading, invisibility, and flight. These revelations are at first treated a little casually by the author, not spending too much time in the initial shock of them. Each power has its liabilities and issues firmly grounded in asking a simple, realistic “what if”? If you suddenly had super strength, how would you keep from breaking things? If you gained super speed, would you start to have trouble slowing down?
Once they understand their powers and they learn who all got powers, one character drives them to follow the superhero paradigm: wear costumes/disguises, do good, don’t get caught. They ponder the equally weighty viewpoints on powers:
Ben Parker (Spiderman): “With great power comes great responsibility.”
John Acton: “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.”
Now in a typical superhero tale, there is a foe worthy of superhero powers: a supervillain, alien invaders, something out of control of normal authority. In Superpowers, there is no supervillain. Our five heroes foil burglaries, domestic abuse, robberies, and save people from burning buildings. They are powerful, but they aren’t perfect. Things don’t always turn out nice and clean and they have to deal with that as well.
This all plays out over the summer of 2001 in Madison Wisconsin. Knowing the tragic date that is coming lends a dark undertone to the whole book.
All in all, it turned out to be a book I couldn’t put down. I got invested in those five people and in how Mr. Schwartz was handling the ‘reality’ of superpowers. It wasn’t a four-color, Hollywood ending but isn’t that the real fantasy?