Somebody shared this on Facebook, and I thought it was just the thing for a book blog. The only known footage of author Mark Twain, taken by Thomas Edison in 1909.
Somebody noted in the comments that both Twain and his daughter Jean would be dead within a year.
What do we learn from this fragment? Well, Mark Twain walked a little funny. Also, Thomas Edison was a better inventor than cinematographer. Didn’t it occur to him that the middle daughter’s face, in the second scene, is mostly hidden behind that samovar, or whatever the thing is? Then she puts on a big hat, and we can’t even see her hair. Frame the shot, Tom!
Mike Hall, over at The American Culture (where I am also known to post now and then) offers a flattering review of my novel, Troll Valley.
In all of his novels, Lars Walker has managed to combine realism with wild fantasy, producing a fascinating hybrid genre that makes for compelling reading. As an artist, he has arrived, and he just keeps getting better and better.
Guys who wear porkpie hats are always, in my experience, up to no good—and pleased about it. Whether that style of headwear turns previously benign men into sociopaths or whether men who are already sociopaths are drawn to that style is one of those mysteries that will never be solved, though the Department of Justice has probably funded a score of scientific studies of the issue.
Another Odd Thomas novel from Dean Koontz, another home run. I won’t say Odd Apocalypse is my favorite in the series—I won’t even say I’m sure I liked it better than the previous novella, Odd Interlude, which I reviewed recently. But all these books are so far superior to anything else being done in the genre (assuming I know what the genre is) that you know going in that you’re in for a delight. And you are not disappointed.
Odd Thomas is the simplest of men, with the simplest of desires. All he wants is a quiet life, and to love a girl who is gone. But he’s been entrusted with gifts—the ability to see the “undeparted dead,” and a sort of psychic GPS that helps him find people he’s looking for. Because he’s faithful to God, he employs these gifts for the good of others, which leads him into great danger time and time again. Continue reading Odd Apocalypse, by Dean Koontz→
What to say about the third book in Jeffrey Overstreet’s The Auralia Thread fantasy series, Raven’s Ladder? It’s difficult to decide, really, because these books are in a class by themselves, unlike anything you’ve ever read. Most fantasies are derivative to one degree or another. The Auralia Thread is a thing unto itself. It reminds me a little of Mervyn Peake’s Titus Groan books, but the resemblances are remote, and very few of you will have read them anyway.
Although the story isn’t locked into one location, the bulk of Raven’s Ladder takes place in the city-state of Bel Amica, which we’ve known only by reputation in the previous books. Since most of the Bel Amicans we’ve met already were favorable characters, one is inclined to think well of the place. But the rottenness in sophisticated, luxurious Bel Amica is as serious as was the rottenness in the ruined kingdom of Abascar. It’s just a decay of a different kind. Continue reading Raven’s Ladder, by Jeffrey Overstreet→
I have another article up at The American Spectator Online today. It’s about the problem of how young people are to understand the thinking of their ancestors, especially on issues like slavery.
And then, this morning, James Lileks pointed me to an article from io9 that perfectly illustrates the problem. This writer talks about the “mysterious” culture of the Incas, which “had no markets.”
The secret of the Inca’s great wealth may have been their unusual tax system. Instead of paying taxes in money, every Incan was required to provide labor to the state. In exchange for this labor, they were given the necessities of life.
Of course, not everybody had to pay labor tax. Nobles and their courts were exempt, as were other prominent members of Incan society….
Only someone who has completely failed to understand history, in the sense about which I write for the Spectator, could fail to recognize the actual nature of Incan civilization. The common people were all slaves.
Last night as I was getting ready to turn in, I turned on Dennis Miller’s talk show, which is delay-broadcast here. A married couple was sitting in for him (I forget their names), and they announced that their next guest would be their friend Dean Koontz, to talk about his new novel, Odd Apocalypse.
I listened to the interview and took the book’s release date, my birthday, as a sign from heaven that I was meant to buy it now, and not wait for a lower price when the paperback comes out.
