Book Review: "Dead Until Dark," by Charlaine Harris (2001)

You've probably heard about True Blood by now, even if you don't have HBO. Or cable. Even if you don't watch TV at all, you've probably heard about it from someone. I haven't watched it myself, but I may have to, now that I've started reading the books that the show's based on.




Dead Until Dark is the first of The Southern Vampire Mysteries, a.k.a. The Sookie Stackhouse Mysteries, retroactively known as the True Blood Series, after the debut of the HBO miniseries in 2008. The books follow the life and loves of one Sookie Stackhouse, a cocktail waitress in the small rural town of Bon Temps, Louisiana.

The book begins roughly two years after vampires have "come out of the coffin" and revealed themselves to the world at large. Thanks to a synthetic blood-substitute developed by Japanese scientists, vampires no longer need to feed off humans, and have decided to reveal themselves en masse.

Now, let's get one thing out of the way: yes, Sookie is a telepath. While this seems like it would make for a very boring mystery novel, Sookie's "disability" is handled very well, and never feels like a cheap way to conjure up a hard-to-find clue. In fact, instead of feeling like a contrived power-up, it comes across as a legitimate difficulty for Sookie in her daily life. It sometimes makes it difficult for her to keep a job, and it's nearly impossible for her to have sex with any man. Any human man, that is...

You're probably thinking to yourself: Vampires? Mind-reading? Twoo wuv? Where have I heard this before? But before you hit the "Back" button on your browser, you should know that Dead Until Dark hit shelves four years before Twilight did. That's right, Twilight is the ripoff, not True Blood.

Anyway, the book itself is really good. It has just the right mix of sex, danger, mystery, humor, and the supernatural. I found myself thoroughly enjoying the story, and more than a little interested in the "romantic interludes". By which I mean sex, sex, and lots more sex. At times, the text can be a little, shall we say, blush-inducing, but never graphic. Harris' sex scenes are always veiled with polite Southern modesty, which prevents the story from degenerating into pornographic wish-fulfillment. The characters are likable and imperfect, with foibles and shortcomings that keep their interactions honest and human. Harris does an excellent job of delving into vampiric psychology, and how the curse of immortality might weigh heavily on one's sanity and morality.

The most refreshing part of the book by far is the subversion of one of the most pervasive tropes in all supernatural fiction: The Masquerade. Gone are the frantic rushes to destroy evidence of vampires' existence, gone too is the need for cloak-and-dagger secrecy, because everyone already knows that vampires are real. They're over it. They've got pride rallies, for gosh sakes!

I also really liked the way Harris depicts the reaction of average Americans to the sudden appearance of the undead in their midst. First, of course, there was shock, followed closely by disbelief. Then a wave of curiosity, followed by revulsion for some, and fascination for others. Finally, the dust began to settle, and the vast majority of American citizens began to see vampires as neither freaks nor sex-objects, but as potential sources of revenue.

And isn't that really just another expression of the American Dream?

Book Review: City of Thieves, by David Benioff (2008)

Brianna loaned me this book back in... oh, late summer, I'd guess. Early fall? I'd told her I would read it, and I liked the blurb, but I wasn't really committed. Then, sometime in November, I actually read the first chapter, and was hooked. The first sentence is one of the best opening lines I've ever read:

"My grandfather, the knife-fighter, killed two Germans before he was eighteen."

Unfortunately, I was too deeply engaged in NaNoWriMo to stop and read it, but I resolved to start it the moment I finished my first draft.

City of Thieves is the real-life story of David Benioff's grandfather Lev, and how he survived the brutal siege of Leningrad during the Great Patriotic War. Arrested for looting a dead Nazi's corpse, the young Lev Abramovich Beniov is thrown in jail with a handsome, insufferably cheerful deserter named Kolya. The punishment for their crimes (as it was for all crimes at that period), was summary execution. But instead of being shot and dumped on the ice of the River Neva, the two men are given a chance to save their lives: if they can find one dozen eggs for Colonel Grechko's daughter's wedding cake, and deliver them to him in four days, they go free. If not, well, he took their ration cards, so good luck getting anything to eat in the next few months.

I'd like to give you a little perspective on the complete insanity of such an order: Leningrad had been under siege for months. People were burning railroad ties, and breathing the toxic fumes they released, because being poisoned was still better than freezing to death. People were shelling out a hundred rubles for a cup of dirt from the floor of a bombed-out sugar factory. Pigeons were the only meat available, because all the dogs and cats had already been eaten. As Lev so artfully puts it, "By January the rumors had become plain fact. No one but the best connected could feed a pet, so the pets fed us."

In a city suffering this level of deprivation, Col. Grechko wants them to find not two or three eggs, but twelve!

It's an incredible book. I've never read another book that so artfully mixes comedy and tragedy, frequently in the same breath. At times, I wasn't sure if I was laughing or crying for the two bewildered young men. Lev often comments about the strange beauty of war, even in the midst of its terrible destructive power. There's something oddly poetic about tracer bullets streaking across the night sky. Lev is a deeply sympathetic young man, and Kolya is at once the funniest and most infuriating character I've encountered in a long, long time. He always knows how to make a bad situation worse, and still manages to come away smelling like roses.

This book reminds me a bit of Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five, with its emphasis on the absurd unreality of warfare. Everything seems so pointless, so hopeless, it's a minor miracle that they even keep moving, when the future is so assuredly grim. But it's kind of inspiring to see how they survived such brutality and danger. It makes me grateful for what I've got, even when the economy's so bad.

After all, it could be worse: you could be living in Russia.

Paperback Writer

There's no use beating around the bush. I've decided to put my novel on hold for a few months.

It's not that I doubt my ability to finish typing it up by the end of January, as I vowed to do in my New Year's Resolutions (though we're more than a third of the way through the month already, and there's little chance that I'll get it done in time.) No, the reason is that I've re-evaluated my needs versus my desires, and decided that I need to devote myself to finding a serious, post-graduation job more than I need to finish my book. The job search is time-sensitive; my book is not.

I'd always intended to keep up the job search and type up the novel, as parallel endeavors. But the time has come to do the grown-up thing, and admit that I'm not Superman. I simply don't have the time or mental agility to do both jobs effectively. I need to pick one, and work on it 'till it's done. Then I'll take up the other, and finish that one, too. But I need to do them one-at-a-time. That's the only way I can do justice to both of them.

I'll pick up the pen (well, keyboard, anyway) after I've found a serious job. I'll let you know when that is.

Movie Review: "TRON: Legacy"

In short, it's not worth the price of admission. If you really want to know why, then by all means read on. I just didn't want you to waste any more time on this movie than necessary.


I mean, don't get me wrong, this isn't a bad movie. It's just that there's nothing good in it. From start to finish, it's as bland and predictable as a Disney movie can possibly be. You probably already know the whole plot already, or else you could make an educated guess.

The acting is wooden and unbelievable, the narrative is riddled with gaping, obvious plot holes, and the villain is laughably destructive, killing underlings and civilians without warning or mercy, even when it would be in his better interests NOT to kill them.

The good guys are equally unlikeable. Kevin Flynn, the protagonist's Zen-Master/Wizard/Hacker father, never expresses any believable remorse for missing out on twenty years of his son's life. That son, Sam, immediately forgives his father upon learning why he disappeared one night when he was seven, never to be heard from again. Hey, no hard feelings, right? We cool? Yeah, we're cool.

The love-interest, Quorra, lacks even a rudimentary pesonality - she alludes to being less patient that her mentor, but this quality is never demonstrated onscreen. I'd call her eye-candy, but it's a kids' movie, so there's not even enough skin to make her any more appealing visually than she is emotionally. But this doesn't stop Sam from falling for her the moment she bursts right into the Games Arena in a transforming off-road vehicle (no joke!) to save his sorry ass, even though she's never seen him before.


It might, might, be worth the price of admission, if you're:
A) a kid under the age of eight,
B) a CGI-fanatic, or
C) such an enormous fan of the franchise that it's starting to damage your social life.
If none of these terms could be applied to you, then just save your money.

ADDENDUM: There was one bit that I thought was clever. When Sam and Quorra go to the dance club (yes, really!), the event is DJ-ed by two helmeted men who look suspiciously like an homage to the French techno-duo Daft Punk.


... that's it. The only part of the whole movie that was clever or (intentionally) funny.

Book Review: “The Spiderwick Chronicles, Vol. 2: The Seeing Stone" by Holly Black and Tony DiTerlizzi (2003)

In the second entry to the Spiderwick Chronicles, we begin to see a darker, scarier side to the realm of the fae, as well as the darker side of our hero, Jared Grace. In Volume 1, he was largely shy and reserved. In Volume 2, we begin to see the first hints of his anger and rage. He's obviously hurting; his parents are newly divorced, his dad lives on the other side of the continent, and his mother still believes him to be responsible for the dangerous and mean-spirited "pranks" of the brownie-turned-boggart Thimbletack. He's not doing well at school, either. All that frustration and helplessness must (and does) find a release.

After Jared's identical twin brother Simon is spirited away by an invisible band of goblins, Thimbletack tells Jared that he knows a way to help Jared see the fae: his Uncle Arthur's seeing-stone.

Thimbletack leads the boy to the workshop where the stone resides, but refuses to give it to Jared until he makes a promise not to use it improperly, or show it to anyone else, and to return it safely when he's done. Frustrated at the brownie's refusal to cooperate while his brother may be in mortal danger, Jared attacks the little man and takes the stone from him by force, setting in motion a terrible chain of events.

I liked the construction of this book; it's very taut and exciting, with almost no unnecessary elements. Everything leads quickly and precisely to a satisfying conclusion. It's a very satisfying read.

I was a little shocked (in a good way) by the story's brutal honesty; particularly with regards to the fate of Simon's cat. I feel that a lot of authors, particularly those writing for young adults, are afraid to allow characters to fail or come to bad ends. Especially good or innocent characters.

...But I feel that allowing the unfairness and capriciousness of real life to bleed into the text allows for a more powerful effect when the heroes do eventually triumph, because their victory was never guaranteed.

Book Review: “The Spiderwick Chronicles, Vol. 1: The Field Guide" by Holly Black and Tony DiTerlizzi (2003)

I've known of these books for a while now. I saw a boxed set of them on the shelf in my cousins' basement, and read the first chapter of the first book, thought it was good, and decided to check 'em out. Then I promptly forgot to do so.

Fast forward to October 2010. While searching the children's section of the Ypsilanti District Library for books on fairies (for reference, of course!), I came across Arthur Spiderwick's Field Guide to the Fantastical World Around You. Each and every creature depicted therein (in beautiful, full-color plates) combined aspects of real-world flora and fauna to create something that was fantastical, and at the same time, believable.

I had to see more. So I began to read the books from which the illustrations were taken.

I've recently completed the first book of the five-volume Young Adult series, The Field Guide. It's a very quick read: I finished it in two bus-rides. The Library of Congress blurb in the front of the book pretty much says it all:

When the Grace children go to stay at their great-aunt Lucinda's worn Victorian house, they discover a field guide to fairies and other creatures and begin to have some unusual experiences.

The illustrations are pen-and-ink, with a pronounced sketchy quality, like the scientific portraits that Darwin or Audubon might have drawn in their journals while observing nature in action. In his dedication, the artist, Tony DiTerlizzi, specifically thanks noted illustrator Arthur Rackham (1867-1939), hoping that he may "continue to inspire others as you have me." Rackham is also no doubt the visual inspiration for the titular Arthur Spiderwick, author of the eponymous Field Guide.

I especially liked the illustration on page 42 ("Just chop it."), depicting Mallory, the eldest of the three Grace children, with her hair tied to the bedstead in dozens of tangled braids by a malicious boggart. It's surreal.

I also liked the honesty of the book's depiction of childhood as a time of unfairness and fear. I feel that far too many authors (and people in general) look back on their childhoods through sepia-toned glasses. They forget the fear that accompanied each night in a strange house, the unfair conclusions to which adults often leap, and the powerlessness that a small child feels in relation to school, their older siblings, and their parents.

It's gratifying to see that some people still remember what it was like, being a kid in a grown-up's world.

Novel Progress: Slow

I haven't been religious about keeping up with my word count. I'll admit it. I feel bad about this; I feel like I'm slacking off. In a sense, promises you make to yourself are the most important ones of all. There's no one else to disappoint, so really it's a test of your own willpower. How far will you go under your own steam?

On the other hand, I do have a pretty good impetus to get this thing done: that check I'll have to write to a certain group of assholes out in Kansas. I have no intention of ever giving them anything more substantial than the finger. I will NOT be sending them money at the end of this month, because I'll be finishing my damn book!

In related news, many other cooks in the kitchen at Buffalo Wild Wings have expressed interest in reading my book when it's done. One of them, who admitted that he hasn't read a book for pleasure since he graduated high school (!), said that he's eager to read my novel. Another, who never reads for pleasure and works "a hundred hours a week" (seriously, he does!), said that he would make an exception for my book. This is flattering, and does more than a little to inflate my ego, but it's also daunting: it means people are actually going to read this thing!

In a related note, I've been debating whether I should continue on a second project after finishing this book (since it looks like I'll finish the story in less than 330 more pages). I'd like to be able to say that I finished NaNoWriMo this year, not just finished the novel I've been plunking away at for a year. Writing 50,000 words in a month just sounds so much more impressive. But I've only done a quarter of the writing, and I'm halfway through the month. That means I'd have to do three-quarters of the work in half the time.

Part of me says that just finishing the novel is enough, and I'll need the extra time to do editing anyway. What do you think? Should I keep going after I finish? Or stop punishing myself and stick with one project at a time?