After recovering from his earlier coughing fit, "rogue video blogger" Billy Horowitz continues with his Top 5 Reasons Why THE AVENGERS Movie Totally Sucked And Also Was Stupid. Tickets for the world premiere of TRUE BELIEVERS are going fast, with only 50 seats in the theatre, so make sure to get yours ahead of time while you still can! [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gtR7kMEf5q4]
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Thom Dunn is a Boston-based writer, musician, and utterly terrible dancer. He is the singer/guitarist for the indie rock/power-pop the Roland High Life, as well as a staff writer for the New York Times’ Wirecutter and a regular contributor at BoingBoing.net. Thom enjoys Oxford commas, metaphysics, and romantic clichés (especially when they involve whiskey), and he firmly believes that Journey's "Don't Stop Believing" is the single greatest atrocity committed against mankind. He is a graduate of Clarion Writer's Workshop at UCSD ('13) & Emerson College ('08).
Review: The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
Heralded as "the next Twilight" (take that as you will), The Night Circus tells the story of a supernatural traveling circus at the turn of the 20th century, and the many bizarre performers that inhabit this magical world — specifically, two young magician apprentices, bound from a young age to compete in a vaguely-defined duel to the death but who inevitably fall in love instead. Basically it's like LOST, but with a circus tent instead of an island — with pretty much all of its strengths as well as its shortcomings. I had the pleasure of meeting the author, Erin Morgenstern, at a lovely book launch party in Concord, Massachusetts (where much of the book is set — they had magicians and fortune tellers and everything! Also sesame chicken NOM NOM NOM). This is her first novel, and there's already a film adaptation in production (from the producers of Twilight, no less!). I'm sure the book, with its fantastical imagery, will actually do quite well, and I wish her the best of luck with it. For now, however, you can read my full review over at DailyGenoshan.com.
Review: "The Night Circus" by Erin Morgenstern on DailyGenoshan.com
The Night Circus is available Tuesday, September 13, wherever books are sold.
#1stWorldProblems: The Novel
Apparently Nicole Richie is a New York Times Bestselling Novelist. I'm sorry, I'm not sure if you heard me correctly. Nicole Richie is a New York Times Bestselling Novelist.
Upon discovering this fact, I took upon myself to read the debut novel responsible for awarding her such a distinction.
While it would be harsh and unfair to say that I regret this decision, I can confidently say that it was hardly a good decision. Next time such a thought crosses my scattered and impulsive mind, I implore you to stop me and question my poor decision-making skills.
In the meantime, I hope you enjoy my objective critical review of the novel over on DailyGenoshan.com.
Review: "The Truth About Diamonds," by Nicole Richie
Review: Fun & Games by Duane Swierczynski
Fun & Games, the newest novel from crime fictioneer/Marvel Comics scribe Duane Swierczynski, is the first installment in a trilogy of books about protagonist Charlie Hardie, an ex-cop(-ish) with a blood past from Philadelphia (where else?). It's a frantic loveletter to LA noir, with blistering energy and labyrinthine conspiracies revealing how Hollywood really runs the world. So it's kind of like Mulholland Drive, except it actually makes sense (no offense, David Lynch). Read my full review of Fun & Games over at DailyGenoshan.com!
Kitties and Nihilism. Yum.
Better late than never, I have a new review up on DailyGenoshan.com of The Meowmorphosis, the latest literary mash-up from Quirk Books, wherein Gregor Samsa awakens to find that he turned into a giant cockroach giant adorable kitty. From the publisher:
“One morning, as Gregor Samsa was waking up from anxious dreams, he discovered that he had been changed into an adorable kitten.”
The phenomenal success of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies inspired a massively popular literary-remix movement. Now Quirk Classics once again charts bold new territory, turning the monster-mash-up formula inside out to infuse Franz Kafka’s horrific masterpiece, The Metamorphosis, with the fuzziest, snuggliest, most adorable creatures possible: kittens!
Meet Gregor Samsa, a humble young man who works as a fabric salesman to support his parents and sister. His life goes strangely awry when he wakes up late for work and finds that, inexplicably, he is now a man-sized baby kitten. His family freaks out: Yes, their son is OMG so cute, but what good is cute when there are bills piling up? And how can he expect them to serve him meals every day? If Gregor is to survive this bizarre, bewhiskered ordeal, he’ll have to achieve what he never could before — escape from his parents’ house. Complete with haunting illustrations and a provocative biographical exposé of Kafka’s own secret feline life, The Meowmorphosis will take you on a journey deep into the tortured soul of the domestic tabby.
Book Review: The Meowmorphosis by Franz Kafka & Coleridge Cook on DailyGenoshan.com
Time Travel! Murder! Philadelphia! OH EM GEE!
Most people who know me can vouch for the fact that I love just about anything involving (a) time travel, or (b) noir tropes. Fortunately, Expiration Date, the latest novel from Philadelphia genre master Duane Swierczynski, features both (along with some great beer and records. Even better!), and you can read my full review over at DailyGenoshan.com. Here's the blurb from the back of the book:
Recently unemployed journalist Mickey Wade lucked into a rent-free apartment — his sick grandfather's place. The only problem: it's in a lousy neighborhood — the one where Mickey grew up, in fact. The one he was so desperate to escape.
But now he's back. Dead broke. And just when he thinks he's reacher rock bottom, Mickey wakes up in the past. Literally.
At first he thinks it's a dream. All of the stores he remembered from his childhood, the cars, the rumbles of the elevated train. But as he digs deeper into the past, searching for answers about the grandfather he hardly knows, Mickey meets the twelve-year-old kid who lives in the apartment below.
The kid who will grow up to someday murder Mickey's father.