Supergods is an epic work of non-fiction. The nature of the book cannot be easily distilled. It is a history of the comic book superhero, but it is far from comprehensive. It is Morrison’s biography, yet contains only a few anecdotes. It is a study of society in the twentieth century through the eyes of alternative cultures, yet barely touches on most of the major events during that century. It is a speculation of various spiritual beliefs but presents no hard evidence of Morrison’s experience. It is fascinating, frustrating, informative and fulfilling. Morrison is one of the top comic book…
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We all love sandwiches and if anybody says differently you better keep an eye on them because they are up to something. Though I am willing to wager the average person might have the knowledge to make four sandwiches tops. This might be due to keeping things simple for simplicity sake, but for some of us its due to the fact that we don’t know how to make anything more complex then a PB&J or Ham Sandwich. What if you want to make a grinder? Or Italian Beef?  Or a delicious Pastrami on Rye (so delicious you guys)? Till now…
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First of all, I’m not married, and probably won’t be anytime soon. However I am in a long-term relationship, and after noticing that this book’s topics included “How to Drive Together in Peace,” I thought, “Oh baby, that I need to know.” Eric San Jaun’s Stuff Every Husband Should Know, from the always-entertaining Quirk Books, is a guide for the domesticated man. Where many similar tomes are packed with useless, outdated relationship maxims, this handy pocket-sized compendium gives you practical problem solving methods for spats with your spouse. But it doesn’t stop there — San Juan goes on to provide a…
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Recently I highlighted ten novels championed by the literary elite that I have argued are science fiction or fantasy, precisely the kind of books that a certain class of reader and critic routinely turn their nose up. These are the kind of books such as Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go that are lauded in the press and loved by conventional reading groups. However, if this science fiction take of dystopian England and clones was written by a mainstream SF author such as Greg Bear or Charles Stross, I doubt the reaction would be the same. It is of course…
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We all know what science fiction is about aliens, spaceships, laser guns. Something about the future where the science is a bit hokey, but consistent within the specified universe. Okay, so warp drive is impossible, but in Star Trek, they can’t cross the universe by just thinking about it. We all know what fantasy is, right? Wizards and elves and magic, or maybe ghosts and demons. Although most fantasy follows its own internal logic, there’s no limits to what might happen. After all, in Supernatural, they are arguing with God! Wrong.  Dead wrong. So, here is a list of fiction…
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There’s something special about a book which only increases as it becomes older. They have a unique smell. They have texture. Heft. So what would be the point of an exhibition, albeit at the British Library, which is essentially a bunch of old books open at a single page behind glass? You can’t feel then, smell them, touch them. What indeed… I was very excited by the prospect of visiting the Out of This World exhibit at the British Library. I’d been informed that it would be geek heaven. I’d seen a short piece on the TV with China Mieville…
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“Nobody’s that stupid. She must’ve been hitting on you.” As I sprawled out on the hotel room bed with a big, blue book in my lap, Mike told me about how I blew it with the waitress who somehow thought I had a British accent. Although I did want to hear what he had to say, my eyes were drawn to the weighty tome in my hands. Women may come and go, but the words on those pages were an important piece of another conversation I was having at the time. It was then that I learned what it was to…
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Despite all this divulging of long-held secrets, what you won’t be reading about in this book are salacious details of, say, for example… my first sexual experience This is the last sentence of the second chapter of Simon Pegg’s memoirs Nerd Do Well. The third chapter promptly goes on to tell of Pegg’s first sexual experiences. This is the irreverent nature of Nerd Do Well. Mr. Pegg isn’t just content with break his own rules and starts his non-fiction biography with… a fictional account of himself. Interspersed between the stories of his life is the tale of a fictional globetrotting…
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Big Machine by Victor LaValle is, on the face of it, a rollicking old-school adventure. It subjects the reader to layers of complex character history; desperately dragging you along to the dénouement, but leaves you wanting more and in a thoughtful state of mind. It is that classic trope, extraordinary things happening to seemingly ordinary folk. But are they all they seem? Ricky Rice is a middle aged man in a dead end job. He has a dark history of drugs and broken relationships. He is the sole survivor of a tiny cult known as the Washerwomen who re-wrote the…
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There’s a wee bit of monomania going on in The Great Stagnation, which kind of befits its subject: the current economic downturn and how it is unlikely to really end anytime soon. This is author Tyler Cowen’s fixation as he ponders our plight is on the idea of “low-hanging fruit” and what it means when it’s all gone. It’s interesting to contemplate and Cowen makes a lot of good points with it, but it’s also pretty simplistic, and the resulting book suffers from a lot of confirmation bias. What Cowen means when he refers to low-hanging fruit is the idea…
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