2000-2009: My Favorite Books (and a few I disliked)

I didn’t title this *best of decade* simply because that sounds pretentious, like I have a final say on what’s good or bad.  *My favorites* is just that: what I loved, what I liked, my personal opinion and therefore I can say/pick whatever I want without being subjected to people yelling at me for pretending [...]

Quality Assessment: Dennis Lehane’s “Shutter Island”

I finished reading this a few days ago.  It only took me 5 days which is a new record.
I’m not a follower of Dennis Lehane.  This is actually my first book of his. Previously I’ve only known of his work through the movie adaptations of Mystic River (great drama, but how I hated the ending) and [...]

Incoming: The Road-Extended Trailer

It is safe to say that my anticipation for the film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s masterful novel The Road has reached fever pitch.  There’s absolutely no other movie left on the 2009 Calendar that I’m looking forward to more.
The movie was supposed to come out over a year ago and though I usually hate delays, this [...]

Quality Assessment: Neil Gaiman’s “American Gods”

Oh Neil.
I was really looking forward to this one: lots of accolades+Neil Gaiman+the endless possibilities of the plot’s mythology=gold, right?  Not even close.  And that’s a shame really, because the reviews alone were really exciting, alas, I have to keep telling myself that not every book is for me (or everyone for that matter) to get or like [...]

The Classics: Mark Z. Danielewski’s “House of Leaves”

I’ve been meaning to write this post for a while now and for some reason or another I kept forgetting about it so I’ll delay no more.  Curious thing though, even though I have this here blog and email and what-have you, I’m not really a big internet kinda guy.  If I was, I would have heard [...]

Happy National Bookstore Day!

Now PLEASE go support your local INDEPENDENT bookstore.  See how I specified “independent” there and not B&N or Borders?  They will always be there; your local independent store may not so go support them instead…….. Now damn it!!
Just kidding!……not really.

Quality Assessment: Steve Hall’s “The Raw Shark Texts”

Steve Hall’s The Raw Shark Texts is the geekiest book I’ve read. Now, that’s not an insult in any way, what I mean is that it uses so much inventive *pc lingo* that a times it feels like someone who’s obsess with computers and technology–aka a geek–will be in book heaven here.  There’s no question that Steve Hall [...]

E-Readers killed the Old-Fashioned Book Stars

I’m not a fan of e-readers; I don’t have one and I don’t have any plans on ever owning one. I was going to rant and rant and rant about how the Kindle and its kind will destroy the publishing industry in the same way that music downloads destroyed the music industry, but after the insanity [...]

Quality Assessment: Tom Rob Smith’s “Child 44″

Ever since it came out last year, I’ve been meaning to read Child 44 which is a sort of an odd thing in itself seeing as how I don’t usually read thrillers, specially the kind that involves a cop as the main character, which is the reason why I’ve skipped many a Dean Koontz book, [...]