As interesting a study in genre as I can recall. If anyone else wrote this bludgeoning, gore-soaked novel, it would be horror, but the name on the cover makes it literature. Some of the violence is hard to take, but the language is amazing. Echoes of McCarthy in Brian Evenson’s Old West.
Buy Blood Meridian at Amazon
Book: 33/52
52/52: An ongoing project to read one book a week and document those books with reviews of 52 words each.
Jun 28, 2008 | Categories: 52 Books/52 Weeks | Leave A Comment »
A good high concept: in an alternative 1920s, where demons overran the earth after World War I, a man and boy run booze across the countryside. The execution is less polished. Henderson’s moody, inky, appealing work recalls Sin City-era Frank Miller, but this thin volume’s story feels slight and doesn’t quite engage.
Buy Smuggling Spirits Vol. 1 at Amazon
Book: 32/52
52/52: An ongoing project to read one book a week and document those books with reviews of 52 words each.
Jun 26, 2008 | Categories: 52 Books/52 Weeks | Leave A Comment »
I’ve been doing some writing recently, and will be doing more throughout the year, for RI EPSCoR, the Rhode Island Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research, via the good offices of The Basics Group, who has created a terrific new website for EPSCoR and its related organizations.
As part of this work, I’ll be writing a series of articles about scientific research at higher ed institutions in Rhode Island. The first two of these articles are now live:
Jun 24, 2008 | Categories: News | Leave A Comment »
The second installment of Aaron’s noir-on-the-reservation series. This collection of linked short stories focusing on an individual characters on the night of the opening of the reservation’s casino is more appealing than the first volume, with deep and rewarding character work. Not sure I’ll be buying volume 3; just don’t feel compelled.
Buy Scalped Vol. 2 at Amazon
Book: 31/52
52/52: An ongoing project to read one book a week and document those books with reviews of 52 words each.
Jun 23, 2008 | Categories: 52 Books/52 Weeks | Leave A Comment »
I’d
decided to quit this pointless series before its end, but found I’d mail-ordered the final volume and forgotten. Since the book was in hand, I read it. Mistake. The series ends on an utterly pointless and befuddling note, hardly resolving key plot points and adding a bunch of junior high philosophizing.
Buy Dragon Head Vol. 10 at Amazon
Book: 30/52
52/52: An ongoing project to read one book a week and document those books with reviews of 52 words each.
Jun 21, 2008 | Categories: 52 Books/52 Weeks | Leave A Comment »
Despite this blog looking like I do nothing but read a lot of comics and the occasionally novel, I’ve been hard at work the last few months on a number of projects. Many have been mentioned on this site, some have not.
Among the most interesting and exciting things I’ve been working on can’t be fully revealed yet – especially so as not to jinx them. We writers are a cowardly and superstitious lot – but I can say this: In the last few weeks, I’ve sent a book proposal to 10 publishers and four different graphic novel proposals to two publishers.
Wish me luck!
Jun 19, 2008 | Categories: News | 2 Comments »
From a series of short books on important albums. This one, on Black Sabbath’s album of the same name, is by my favorite musician, John Darnielle, AKA the Mountain Goats. This essay is written in the form of a novel about a kid locked against his will into a residential treatment facility.
Buy Master of Reality at Amazon
Book: 29/52
52/52: An ongoing project to read one book a week and document those books with reviews of 52 words each.
Jun 17, 2008 | Categories: 52 Books/52 Weeks | Leave A Comment »
I’m happy to reveal that I’ve been working with Bridgewater State College for the last few months to help three departments there — School of Graduate Studies, Continuing and Distance Education, and External Affairs — improve their search engine optimization. We’ve been working on both organic and pay-pay-click techniques and expect the work to go full live this summer. I’ve been collaborating with Pawtucket-based writer Anna MacGregor Robin on this project.
Jun 16, 2008 | Categories: News | Leave A Comment »
An early work by artist Kyle Strahm, one of my collaborators on Split Lip. Kyle’s work is distinctive and beautiful, though the print-on-demand reproduction undermines his art — the blacks are weak, not deep enough. Kyle’s got more, higher-profile work coming soon. I’ve seen a bit — and now can’t wait to see more.
Book: 28/52
52/52: An ongoing project to read one book a week and document those books with reviews of 52 words each.
Jun 15, 2008 | Categories: 52 Books/52 Weeks | Leave A Comment »
An anthology covering the growing crossover between literary fiction and genres like horror, science fiction, and fantasy. I love those kinds of stories, but this group was weak. It would have been great to see Dan Chaon, Brian Evenson, or Steve Erickson in it. Instead, some of these stories just felt limp.
Buy Conjunctions 39 at Amazon
Book: 27/52
52/52: An ongoing project to read one book a week and document those books with reviews of 52 words each.
Jun 13, 2008 | Categories: 52 Books/52 Weeks | Leave A Comment »
This concept is appealing — a story about Japanese legends and ghosts, by English and American creators — but the execution fails a bit. Beautiful art, but the stories don’t have much weight to them and it’s hard to engage with the characters. The series has been cancelled and I’m done with it here.
Buy Crossing Midnight Vol. 2 at Amazon
Book: 26/52
52/52: An ongoing project to read one book a week and document those books with reviews of 52 words each.
Jun 12, 2008 | Categories: 52 Books/52 Weeks | Leave A Comment »
Wood and Burchielli’s alternate history of a new U.S. civil war in the near future is generally engaging, though its politics are not necessarily hugely sophisticated. Still, I like them. This examines the pivotal Day 205 massacre through Rashomon-style perspectives. Frustrating story — the massacre itself is gripping, but the fallout somewhat predictable.
Buy DMZ Vol. 4 at Amazon
Book: 25/52
52/52: An ongoing project to read one book a week and document those books with reviews of 52 words each.
Jun 10, 2008 | Categories: 52 Books/52 Weeks | Leave A Comment »
Comics’ only pure police procedural. No other comic is so obsessive in examining, in minute detail, the ways in which we can’t escape our previous actions and how our pasts color our presents. Grist is an excellent page designer, but this volume’s story felt like it made less progress than previous ones.
Buy Kane Vol. 6 at Amazon
Book: 24/52
52/52: An ongoing project to read one book a week and document those books with reviews of 52 words each.
Jun 08, 2008 | Categories: 52 Books/52 Weeks | Leave A Comment »
