The long road back

Ramblings Post #342
I toyed with the idea of putting some cryptic song lyrics here, but in reality I just was doing some other stuff. So I let this slide for a minute. Sorry. Well, not really. This is was always really more for me than for anything else and if my attention waned on a part of me I kinda always knew it would come back. And here it is.

I'm back,

Not that anyone missed me.

I've been working on a lot of personal projects as of late - wrote a book for NaNoWriMo about airship racing in an Alternate-1960s (and I am already tossing around the idea of sequel) while I was in the midst of writing another about a dimension hopping blues band. I got an actual job as opposed to contracting (well, I got an offer). I semi-restarted my epic diet of 2010 ( I write that with a bowl of ice cream on the desk by the keyboard). I signed up for some online classes for some stuff I'm interested in - time management, programming, some law.

I'm doing stuff. Yeah.

And I'm doing all this stuff because if I keep watching the news and seeing just how close we are to a twisted prologue of the movie Idiocracy, or worse, having to find some kids to serve as tribute, I don't know if I'm gonna make it. This is supposed to be America dammit, and the idea that the elected officials serve all Americans, NOT JUST THE ONES WHO VOTED FOR THEM, seems to have been lost somewhere. We live in interesting times. God help us all.

Maybe my memory isn't good, but under the last president I don't remember the country repeatedly stumbling from potential catastrophe to potential disaster on seemingly endless repeat. Or us purposely poking the hornets nests in the Middle East and North Korea because we swear we won't get stung. Or the government so blatantly ignoring the will of the people. And while I half expected the confederacy that we're seeing created before us since that morning I woke up and realized we'd elected an out of touch egocentric narcissistic as President, it's the rest of it that worries me the most.  It's all the change happening at the veritable speed of the internet (before deregulation) with no concern for casualty or consequence beyond a zealot's personal gratification that gives me pause.

A lot has been going on. A lot of it grey matter being treated as Vantablack or pure white. We've entered an age of no compromise and no forgiveness or rehabilitation. We're all suddenly absolutists in a world created by the sum of our parts, experiences, faults and fears

Except me. I'm just a guy. And I'm sitting over here judging you all. And fairly soon I'm gonna start talking about you too.

And I'm not that damn happy either.

Barkeep. Some of that Boone's. Yes, I am aware that it is $100 a bottle at this point. But sometimes it bees like that.

A good story can come from anywhere...

Ramblings Post #302
Sometimes you just find a good story. You sit down and read the first paragraph and you have a few minutes so you keep going. And then you get interested - in a particular character, or a setup and suddenly you find that thirty minutes have passed. But you have to know what happens, so you keep reading. It isn't your normal subject matter, or your normal style, but you keep going. That is good writing. And I just found it on twitter of all places Who would have thunk it? 

I read Zola's story without the intention of actually reading it. I stumbled across it on Reddit, where someone had nicely linked the entire thing, and intended to read a few lines to see what it was all about. I mean, the lead-in was interesting, how did she fall out with the other girl? I don't usually go for things like this, on it's face it seemed almost flimsy, like it it would be over in a few lines. I like to believe I'm a more sophisticated reader, but maybe 50 tweets later as the girls set up shop to start trapping after the club didn't pan out and Zola schooled Jess on "valuation", I was hooked, even at a 140 characters per chapter.

As you know by now the story had everything - plot twists, character development, sex, violence, a very film noir feel and as one twitter follower noted, even passed the Bechdel test. I could see the characters even though she didn't really have space to describe them. It was funny, tragic, parts were a little disturbing and at times it was just flat out amazing. I can't say if the whole thing was true, and even if it wasn't, it was still a very good story.

I can only hope that the stories I put together are this good, and I intended to stick to a basic structure, not just pour it onto the soil like this. It is in reality a little intimidating. It's like trying to compose a song for weeks then hearing that someone made up a hit while eating his breakfast cereal. You wonder a little about effort. You wonder. But you keep writing.

One hopes that Zola's story will be a movie soon. Twitter is already picking out cast members. I see Keith David as the first old guy, at the restaurant when they meet. It's just a feeling I get.

Barkeep. A nice bottle of Merlot. And some pickled eggs.        

A Quick Book Review - Slumberland

I'm reading a lot of books my brother has suggested, and honestly it's been hit or miss. To read his latest suggestion I actually had to activate the Kindle app on my tablet. This is something I had avoided doing for a long time, because I have an issue with Kindle, or Nook, or one of them. Whatever. In any case, my issue is that you don't actually own the books, but read them through a licensing agreement. Which sounds great until you realize it gives them the power to take the books back at any time, without your knowledge. I would say or consent, but we all know its somewhere in the 57-page agreement nobody reads, so whatever. But as a person who re-reads books all the time, sometimes three or four times, the idea of waking up one day and my books are gone just doesn't even feel right.

But I digress.

Slumberland. I wish I could find what the author was on when he wrote it, because the book reads like less like a story and more like the muttered recollections of someone fresh off a three day bender. At 7am and they are still half alseep and still half in the bag. While you putter around somebody's kitchen on a Thursday morning (Do the math.) While trying to conceive of a breakfast that includes chili powder, leftover dip, and pasta. While also trying to remember A)who these other four people are and B) whose house this is and C) whose underwear you have on. Meanwhile everyone is laughing and knows your name. The book feels like that.

What? That exact thing has never happened to you? Um, never-mind. Let's just say it's an odd book.

The hero, um, narrator, um...there's this guy, in a tanning salon. He's black, but he's in a tanning salon. He explains why eventually, but it's not important. Well, maybe it kinda is. Anyway he's produced what he and his sound collective guesses is the perfect piece of music, or so they think. So he, um, goes to...no, tricks these...er, he goes to Berlin, right, just trust me, and he's searching for this guy, this musician he had decided is the singular authority to validate his music. Only he's never met the guy, has no pictures and has no idea what he looks like. It's that kinda music. 

Beatty, the author,  falls into what I'm seeing as the new style....finding a single concept and drilling down to it's very bottom, then creating a story around it, as if to celebrate it. With Ready Player One, it was the 80's video games. With this it's music.

So, this guy ends up working at the Slumberland bar, this spot where German women pick up black guys as the guy who sets the musical tone for the place. He meets some interesting characters on his quest to find this musical guru, and is black in Germany. Seriously, that's a theme, being black. Look, the book flirts with a broad range of stuff, although it makes love to the author's diverse musical tastes, and covers things like bits of philosophy, a take on California, the government, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the modern record industry, pornography, fill in the blank here, something else, etc. It's hard to explain, without telling the whole story, or giving away the bits of the story that make the read interesting. 

Now, be aware, there is not a lot a story, something I only realized after a good bit of reading. It's mostly thoughts and extremely colorful description. Honestly, I could boil the actual story part down to three good paragraphs for Wikipedia. But Beatty takes what he has and tells it well, and as I said, he is so very, very descriptive. There are ramblings and tangents, asides and impressions and a host of other things that aren't really story, but give the story flavor. And a story without a flavor is just text.

This was a good read. Brisk, and occasionally a little convoluted, but good. Maybe you pick it up. Maybe I get another ice cream sandwich.  

A Quick Book Review - Loving Day

As I've said, I've been catching up on my reading. A few things I've read before, to refresh my memory and perhaps take away a different perspective on the material, a few new items to expand my focus of the world around me. To that end, I, um...got some books from brother. One of them was called Loving Day, in part derived from the Loving v. Virigina case that ended the prohibition on interracial marriage. It was okay, which for a book my brother gave me is a pretty damn good review.

As I've mentioned before, my brother and I have different tastes in literature. In his readings he's looking for subtext and nuance and metaphor. In the stuff I read, I actually like for things to happen. I'll admit that a lot of the books I read are HeroWorks - i.e., there is a hero, this is him and you know he's going to win. The creativity comes in the how. This differs from Literature in which we start with the PTS - Person Telling the Story. They may or may not win, let's just see how this goes. This book was kind of a hybrid, a little of this and little of that. There were long passages extolling the protagonist's thoughts, interpretations and concepts, telling HIS story,  but things also actually happened, people went places and did things. Contrary to popular belief, I don't need explosions, gun battles or a chase scene to occur, but I tend to need more than talking heads.

This story, Loving Day, revolves around Warren Duffy, the product of a interracial marriage, who has just gotten out of an interracial marriage coming home to Philadelphia to his dead father's final property renovation project. A hop, skip and jump later he also finds out he's a father, the product of an interracial tryst in his youth that has produced an interracial child. You may or may not have gotten the idea that "interracial" is an ongoing theme for the book. It's subtle, but it's there. 

Using that as a backdrop, the story quickly becomes, well, almost a little to true to life, sliding from issues of sudden fatherhood, dating, the need for acceptance, love in the modern era with sides of class issues, teenage angst, unfulfilled life expectations and even a little art critique thrown in. And ghosts. It's funny, it's thoughtful, and at times even a little poignant. Everything in the story seems to come at you at once, none of it fitting together quite right which makes it all the more readable. But, although the story touches some real world in its themes, it lives in an insulated little reality of its own. 

Don't get me wrong, some of it was predictable. A few things, at least to me, popped out as obvious future occurrences and so it just became a matter of waiting for them to happen. A few others came out of left, just like life. But he also went places, talked to people and tried to accomplish things. So he told a story, but it was an interesting story. A few of the supporting characters seemed less than fleshed out, almost stand ins to project the protagonist's feelings onto. A few others a little too mystical, seemingly unaffected by the world around them. Although these maybe products of the limited scope chosen by the author to convey the tale. Ah, stylistic choices.

I found it a good read. It did not end up where I thought it would, but it got to where it probably needed to be. Worth the few hours I took to digest it, and certainly worth the pages it was printed on.

A Quick Book Review - Ready Player One

I've had some time off for the first time in a minute, so I've been catching up on my reading, among other activities. I also restarted Grand Theft Auto V, but only because my original restart after not playing for ten months got sidetracked, so I started over starting over. But that's not what we're talking about here, my reading is. I've gotten a couple of books from my brother, wandered down the aisle of my local used bookstore and paid more for shipping than for the actual book on Amazon. In any case, although its a few years old, I'd heard a lot about Ready Player One, so I grabbed a used copy and settled in.

I should have been thrilled at this book. I've been into comics and video games since forever, probably qualified as a actual nerd in my youth and I can say truthfully this story didn't just wallow in nerd lore, it bathed in it. To excess. And then turned it into a weird Tron variant. And maybe because of that, the whole thing failed to gel for me.

 I understand the impetus of the story - after he dies, a famous Steve Jobs-esque character (one who actually coded) creates a global treasure hunt with the prize being his vast fortune. This premise, with the clues all focused on this billionaire's own obsession with the eighties made the main character's  focus, and that of the other "players" make some sense. But the weak framing quickly turned the story into a Clive Cussler derivative, in that you know the main character is going to win out in the end, you just don't know how yet. There was never really any doubt now that I think back about it.

It's clear what he was going for - the underdog to hero trope - but the execution is so poorly done, so blatant that you're almost rushing to the next part to see if anything interesting happens. Further there is no real character development, the antagonists are straight from central casting,  the main character has a decided lack of scope in what he relates, there is no real world building outside the virtual environment and the obstacles pop up like Star Trek story points i.e., the only reason they mention X at the start of this chapter is so you'll know why they used X at the end. It's a series of tropes, cliches and shortcomings molded into a totality using nerdy details to hide story holes.  

I read it all the way through in about three days, but it was a fairly good read and I can appreciate it for what it was. I've read too much and for too long and I realize a story doesn't have to be a masterpiece to be enjoyable. And it was enjoyable. I however, wouldn't put it on my suggested reading list.

A Quick Book Review - 1Q84

Ramblings Post #230
I like to read. When I was a kid I would sit at the kitchen counter with a mixing bowl of cereal (I saw it on the Beverly Hillbillies, I'm a shameless mimic) and crack open the latest book. And I would slowly work my way through it, munching all the while, tackling 200-pages or more in one sitting. There is something about a good book. It transports you, educates you, makes you dream and wonder. It awakens the mind. And yet so few people pick up a book and read unless required. So sad.

My Brother's copy, which I must return.

I'm guessing my first warning should have been my brother recommended the book.

Don't get me wrong, my brother is a writer and some of the books he's suggested I read have been excellent. But his milieu is the "human experience," where the author delves into an exploration of the pathos of man's psyche and peers into the nuances of the mundane in an attempt to paint a silhouette of the eternal soul. Or something like that. And I did give the book an okay at first glance, first admiring it's weight and page count, and then liking the print size. Not the best measures I know, but sometimes you take a leap. And it was supposed to be science fiction.  

I get the impression now my brother doesn't read a lot of "science fiction."

Now I've read cerebral science fiction before. The kind that explores new social constructs, new ways of living, new ways of thinking, and have delved into man's inhumanity to both man and alien. This particular story was a more personal introspection. Way more introspection than I'm used to. Probably too much introspection. It was translated from it's original Japanese, where it was a bestseller. Maybe they go big for introspection.

Okay, the facts. The story is one of a man and woman, who crossed paths as children, haven't seen each other in twenty years and now both long for one another. And a novella he ghost writes.  And her struggle against societal constructs. And mystical little people. And cults. There might even be a ghost in there somewhere, I'm not sure. And a parallel world. Well, parallel world kinda of abuses the phrase, but because although it seems key to the story it's not really explored. The point of view is that of the two main characters so the worldview is fairly narrow by design. That is until the last third of the book, where they add a  third person's viewpoint. Seriously, they add a third person viewpoint. Then momentarily a fourth. But I digress.

Perhaps linear writing is more of an American trait. A character appeared, then was gone. Another seemed important, then disappeared. I've read works with disparate timelines for the various viewpoints before, ala Game of Thrones, so that wasn't really an issue. But then the story would stop to describe in detail the guy's dinner or linger on a supporting character's back-story for five pages, just meandering about. These things would pop up, get you interested, then cease to exist within the narrative. There were one or two other things - plot points, lines of logic and such that appeared obvious to me as a science fiction reader that came across as muddled in the tale as well.

And even with all that, the thing about it all, the weird part, is that I found the whole experience of reading it flat. For all the praise this novel has received, I kept seeing characters who lived lackluster lives outside of a single highlight to wedge them into this story. I kept waiting for the moment when everything changed. Or when the characters at least started thinking differently. Or had an epiphany. Or when all the machinations of the narrators culminated into a serious situation. Or something. I don't need gun play or explosions, but a dramatic moment to pin it all up. Or show how it's not going to be pinned all up. Anything at all. Or maybe I missed it. Maybe it was too subtle for my untrained mind.

Maybe the book just wasn't meant for me.

I'm not sure who I would suggest read something like this. It's far too light on the science for science fiction, but not enough character development for actual literature.

Barkeep, I need so cereal, in one of them big mixing bowls. Yes, I realize this is a bar, but isn't the customer always right? 

A Good Read

Ramblings Post #215
To be a good writer, you need to read good writing. But you can't copy it, or even borrow from it. Not literally. What you can take from it is the feeling, the sensation. If you've done it right you can read your own prose and get the same sensation as reading a new novel. It's exhilarating. It's why I've been writing since I was twelve. Now, if I could just get re-writing and editing down....oh, the glory. 

My purchases

One of the things I gave up in my preparations for the bar was casual reading. To give my brain a break I would occasionally do a something quick like a crossword puzzle or play a PC strategy game that only involved the occasional pushing of a button, during which the interval between presses could  sometimes extend into days. I must have a half dozen games of Dwarf Fortress started that I quit because when I got back to them there was no way to apply the Rule of Perpetuities (crazy hard legal concept). So, yesterday, after a late breakfast I made my first trip to the book store in months and bought a book. No, two books.

There is nothing quite like a cold day, a couch, a warm throw and a good book. It's almost magical somehow. And I don't mean a Kindle or Nook, but an actual paper and binding book. The weight in your hand makes it better somehow.

Side note - I don't trust Kindle, a device on which I understand Amazon can TAKE THE BOOKS BACK at their discretion. The idea of waking up and finding my books gone?  Talk about nightmare. 

A good book moves you. It makes you cheer for the hero, lets you peer into the mind of the villain, and does it all while forcing your mind to fill in all the "fiddly bits" of background and color. It's a medium that makes you use your imagination, which is why I get so depressed when a good book is turned into a movie and the director gets it wrong. Or tries to fix the story. Or cut parts out that are too complicated or difficult to explain.

But enough of this. I got reading to do.

Barkeep. I need a bowl of Rice Krispies. No, a box of Rice Krispies. Don't judge me.

Hunger Games (as required by Internet Rule # 47854b)

Ramblings Post #188
There are certain Rules. You always stock hot sauce. The socks stay on. You don't talk about fight club. You don't place a special order then get mad when it takes a while to make. You don't show up late for trial. And it is always the biggest you've ever seen. And if it is a hot topic, your blog must comment on it...if only in passing. So, today, we discuss of all things, a book series I've never even read.

Three books. I guess.

Full Disclosure Warning: I have not read any of the three books. I have no intention of reading these three books. I don't think I've even read the dust jacket or the back cover of one of these books.

What little I do know might have come from SKIMMING the Wikipedia entry.

That said, what follows is NOT an informed opinion. Heck this isn't even going to be about the movie or the book, but about the idea of the book into movie in general. I'm hoping to skirt the rule by believing that the series at least instigated the conversation. At least that's what I'm going to tell the Internet Cops if it comes to that.

Now, I understand that the trilogy (in the rack next to register at the campus bookstore) was supposed to be Young Adult reading, and maybe that's what soured me. The Young Adult works that I have tried to read, well, the writing in general tends to turn me off. It's usually simplistic, lacking depth and poorly plotted. My understanding is that while this story is wildly imaginative, and apparently very popular - it's also ridiculously derivative of Lord of the Flies, The Running Man, the Most Dangerous Game and as I understand it a Japanese novel and film called Battle Royale.

Let me also be clear that I have no intention of seeing the movie. Aside from the fact that I haven't been to the movies in years, the Book to Movie conundrum should give any fan of the books pause. This conundrum is that a popular book being made into a movie generally has to leave some of the things that the fans of the book really liked out...because of time constraints or a directors mental vision. Or more likely, that Hollywood thinks it can do better. That's why Micheal Keaton was the cast as Batman. Twice. Bad example, I liked those films, but in far too many cases this has generally resulted in the film being an unrecognizable mess that upset the real fans. This was true up until faithful adaptions of Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings proved successful proving that fans like good stories, good writing and not just stars.

So which does the Hunger Games film give it's fans? A heavily edited Hollywood version of the book or a faithful vision of the story? Which brings us back to the writing, Young Adult fiction. Which I think is simplistic, lacking depth and poorly plotted. And as I understand from comments at various sites my original thought appears to be right on the money for this series - not so great writing to begin with. So not a good start.

Hopefully this joint will make a few million, some fans will be joyful, a few more actors will get jobs and the world will keep turning. Or maybe it could be the next John Carter?

In any case, I'm not going to see it. Homework.

A Good Read

Ramblings Post #176
I am a reader. But I think I've said that. I read to make me a better writer. I read things I don't always find interesting, or things that I think maybe boring, if only to find out why so I don't replicate them. Which is how I ended up reading those Blaine McCraken novels by Jon Land (And no, I am not linking to those). Let's just say you need to read what you're not going to write, so you know not to write it. That, and I have a lot of free time since I'm off from school.

I love a good read. I started reading when I was young, with the typical for the time Hardy Boys and other fare. I lived in a fairly small town, and there was a time when my mother would let me and my older brother walk...across a major highway, the railroad tracks, a housing project and cut by the stream...to the county library. Unsupervised. This might have been when I was in the first grade, but I'm not sure. It was a while ago.

But I read everything. Historical novels, biographys, fiction, science fiction, fantasy, romance, westerns...most things written on paper. It has to be horrible for me not to read it, but if I get too far into it I'll finish it just because. But once I find something good, it pains me that I can't read all of it or that there isn't enough of it to satisfy me. In need something like Terry Prachett's Discworld series, now at thirty or more books or Battlefield Earth, which clocks in at a thousand plus pages. If the writer is good enough, and the story long enough you grow to like the characters and see them grow and mature which makes for a better read.

Lately, I've taken to reading webcomics. If you look around, what you get are basically graphic novels of a sort, comic books really, minus a lot of the reaching for the masses editing, while still giving enough of a story to read. And because they're webcomics...a lot of them go on for years, so as long as you're willing to hit next for a few while...okay, days...they get to be interesting.

The ones I'm going to list here are science fiction mostly, but the genre covers all areas, including Mary Worth style drama to High School Angst. I don't really read those, but I understand they are out there.

It might have been Monday when I started reading Schlock Mercenary, a series that once the art picked up has actually turned into something pretty good...and has enough width and breadth to amount something fairly intricately plotted. It started in 2001 and has run fairly regularly, with more than 3,000 strips since inception. It's a got a huge cast and continually oddly expanding storyline that just reads like one of those thick novels that has to list all the characters in the front so you can keep track.

Another I've been working my way through is Quantum Vibe, which posts five days a week. I only started a year or two again, and the art isn't as sharp as it could be, but then the author is on a tight schedule. I'm still trying to figure out where the story is going, but so far it's been readable. Mostly.

A new find of mine is Delilah Dirk and the Turkish Lieutenant, a swashbuckling epic. The heroine is... "a master of forty seven different sword fighting techniques, and has fought Sikh warriors, Conquistadores, a small pride of lions and a very large Mongolian man with a large sword, a small brain and a bad temper. " It's been an good read, with great art so far. I'm looking forward to the end.

Another one that only started in the last year is Spacetrawler, a story of seven people abducted by aliens to save an enslaved race...and that story just keeps taking odd turns. The characters are memorable, and extremely flawed however, which makes for great writing. It only publishes twice a week, so I'm getting a little anxious.

I also check in from time to time on one called Endtown, another where the hero is a cross dresser called Skin Horse (don't ask), and the positively existential Sinfest.

May all time favorite however is Girl Genius, the creation of Phil Foligo one of my favorite authors. The book, which I've discussed on here follows the adventures of the title character as she reclaims her family throne. The interesting part is that the story, which posts three times a week, has been at this for years and only recently has gotten to what I guess is the meat of the story.

Two things about the stories that I like is that the characters don't fall into the normal characters that show up in every other story. They tend to move outside normal archetypes. Because the internet is such an inexpensive way to produce the stories outside the norm are possible. And the other thing I like is that the authors tend to embrace the new media of the internet properly. The sites generally don't charge for access. That's right, they give away the product for FREE. But Girl Genius and Schlock sell books of the collected comics...ala Doonesbury.. which actually sell well. I imagine most of the others will eventually if they don't already.

Their leveraging the product to build an audience for the merchandising. It's like when they sell books on Amazon for .99 cents. It's to build an audience.

Most of these I'll wait week to check out so I have a couple of days worth of work to read. And they usually post on a pretty good schedule. My latest interest is Drive, where the author was nice enough to tell you he had another project and the schedule was going to be off. It's a certain closeness to the product. The new medium makes that possible.

Barkeep, a bowl of Rice Krispies. I got some reading to do. Leave the box.

My Brother's book

Ramblings Post #109
This is what they call the final straw. I said I was gonna do it, and since I have the time now, what with the PS3 pilfered, I’m gonna do it. I’m gonna finish one of the many novels I’ve been working on since....a period of time I’m too ashamed to admit. Which works well with my life changes theme currently in play. Okay, it’s not the final straw, but it sure is a good reason to get back to something I do like to do.

For ages my older brother has talked about publishing a book. The Great African American Novel. It’s an odd wish when I think about it, in this day age but I guess my older brother and I are kind of a black down market version of Frasier and Niles Crane: Maybe a little too smart for our own good, maybe a little to urbane, maybe a little too intellectual. My brother runs a blog that covers political commentary while I do...well this. Our mother was a school teacher and I think it shows.

Think black, without the cool suits, or the money.
And one of us actually is balding!

And he’s been working on a novel, as have I, for years now. While other black guys work on a way to put rims on what they’re driving, or try for a record deal, or promoting parties... my brother and I have been “studying the human condition” so we can distill it down to words that educate and inspire. Well, he has, I’ve been trying to write something funny. Well, recently, thanks to the modern technology of Kindle and other ebook readers, he's put together a tome of short stories and managed to get it, I guess, published. Well, e-published.

For some reason he called it DaddyMomma.

He said he named it that a while back and the title stuck with him for some reason, and now means something to him. What it means I’m still working on.

I have yet to read it, due to the pilferage from my house. My backup computer system won't support any of the available e-readers it downloads in (the back up runs on Windows 2000, the readers start at Vista). But I guess i've read snippets and parts of it for years now, a short story here, a story idea there, and to be honest if you plan on checking it out, my brother specializes in literature.

What is literature?

First, let me tell you what literature mostly isn't. It mostly isn't that the "african american author" section in your local book store, with a vast cadre of books that read like badly concieved, outlined and written rap albums in word form. The stories are for the most part exploitative thuggery, simplistic, the characters cardboard or worse, the writing uneven and disjointed. My younger brother bought me a book a few years ago for Christmas, and it nearly spurred me into a writing frenzy as I finished. The idea of that hot mess being published and me not writing anything for publication was like someone laughing at my soul. And I don’t like to be laughed it. Unless I’m telling jokes.

No, my brother writes about themes, and ideas, and characters with depth and flaws. Deep thought provoking stuff. That’s literature. I've seen the other stuff he wrote, but until I get either the wireless for the laptop connection or a new computer, this novel is gonna have to wait for a second, but I’m fairly certain this isn’t a tome of jokes and funny stories. His works are usually about relationships - between father and son, old and young, just stories about people. Literature need not have a compelling story - like a spy novel or adventure tale - but it merely needs to make you think. And my brother is big on making people think.

I just realized that he also doesn’t really ever read what I send him. Interesting. Partly because I'm guessing, what I write doesn't seem to make him want to think.

When I finish, I'm gonna send him the whole thing and ask for a page by page commentary.

Yeah right.

Barkeep, did I tell you my brother wrote a book?

A Quick Book Review - The Shack

Ramblings Post #14
I like to read. There I said it, I'm not ashamed to admit it and I feel so much better for it. I've been reading since I was little. Comic books, Hardy Boys, Encyclopedia Brown, The Great Brain, Westerns, Science Fiction, Whodunits, Adventure, at one point I was bored and Harlequin Romances, War stories, Novels, Poetry...did I mention I like to read? If it wasn't for pesky ole law school, I would still be reading at a pace of a few books a month. So every now and then, I think I'm gonna review a book. My way of course.

When someone gives you something to read, not a pamphlet or an article, but a book or something of substance it means two things. One, it means they figure that you're reasonably intelligent and will understand or take enjoyment in the reading and Two, that you're actually going to read it. My little brother gave me a book this year for Christmas. I gave him an iPod. I figure we're about equal. But then just the other day Sporty mailed me a book.

One of the things I've always liked about Sporty is that she is a reader. I am stunned at the number of folks I meet, talk to and associate with who haven't picked up a book since the last time a class imposed that duty upon them. And of those who do read, a good number disappoint when I find out they only read "black" literature. Um..., I am black, I don't need to read about the black experience, I'm having the black experience. Okay, a little Walter Mosley from time to time, but not a whole whole lot more.

The book she sent was The Shack, a story of spiritual awakening and personal redemption. If you haven't read it, the story is about a man who has lost a child and is enmeshed in sadness. Then one weekend, he gets a note from God asking him to stop by. Thinking himself crazy he shows up and meets God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit, who turn out to be a old black woman, her Arabic son and an Asian woman, in that order. Not quite was he expecting. What follows after is the meat of the story, his conversations with what appear to be the Holy Trinity and his own personal growth and examination of his own viewpoints . He weekends with God, I mean, how's that for bragging rights?

I read it in one sitting. Okay, in one day...I actually did do some work on my paper, er..brief.

From the blurbs on the back, I expected to moved to tears or re-awakened in my soul or something else epiphanic. It was a good story don't' get me wrong. It had some moments that made you re-read a paragraph or two and made you think about some things, always a sign of good writing, and it certainly gave me a new way to look at some other religious concepts. But it wasn't earth shattering for me. My paradigm didn't shift. I may read it again to make sure I didn't miss anything. The ending was kinda cliche, a little telegraphed I must say, but by then you'd gotten most of the message, so you kind of needed it for wrap up. If it that ending hadn't occurred, what preceded it might have come off a little less spiffy.

Would I suggest it for a read? Sure.

Hey Barkeep, what kinda smoothies you got?