|
|
By Aaron Block, on November 30th, 2010 [At the end of each month, Aaron surveys the comics he read, celebrates the best, considers the rest, and takes stock of what it means to be a contemporary comic fan. Follow "The State of My Pull List" here.]
Spotlight:
 Strange Tales II #2 Gathering top-level writers and artists for an anthology title doesn’t always guarantee positive results. DC’s 2009 experiment Wednesday Comics was always interesting, but proved that even veteran creators sometimes struggle in an unfamiliar format. It’s doubly satisfying, then, that the all-star lineup behind Marvel’s Strange Tales II #2 delivers nine excellent stories, some funny and some touching, all evidence of a strong connection to the history of these characters.
This issue kicks off with Gilbert and Jaime Hernandez, playing to their respective strengths with off-beat retro tales. Gilbert’s story features an odd Silver Age team-up of Iron Man and Toro, the original Human Torch’s kid sidekick, while Jaime (who also drew this month’s cover) delivers a beach movie pastiche that combines his love of clever, confident female characters, rock and roll, and sight gags. Jeffrey Brown refigures the psychodrama of the Claremont/Smith-era X-men as contemporary roommate politics, and Tony Millionaire’s trademark surreal humor sees the Mighty Thor as a pickled herring salesman who faces off against Mud-O and Can-Man in an amusement park. My favorite story of the issue, however, is Farel Dalrymple’s take on the first encounter between Spider-Man and the Silver Surfer, which features a page that should resonate with anyone (like me) who pored over How To Draw Comics the Marvel Way as a kid.
It’s no coincidence that the only sour note, Sheldon Vella’s incoherent heavy metal action short, is also the only story that isn’t embedded in a specific corner of Marvel history (as far as I can tell). Collections like this succeed when the creators have some genuine affection for the material, and aren’t just slumming it in the mainstream. …
Continue reading »
By Sean Clark, on November 30th, 2010 [In this feature, we highlight a handful of the best book reviews appearing over the weekend in major newspapers. Follow it here.]
.
Infinite City, by Rebecca Solnit. Reviewed by Adam Kirsch (Barnes and Noble Review).
I’ve always been fascinated with maps. When a book contains one, I refer to it and examine it constantly. Often I find myself flipping through atlasess in libraries. Solnit, as Kirsch describes her work, tells the story of San Francisco through a collection of maps. In his short, but quite good, review, he compares the maps to poetry. I’ve never actually been to San Fran, but I’m betting I’d love this book. …
Continue reading »
By Marc Velasquez, on November 29th, 2010 
[Follow this series here. We're also compiling all our best books in one easy-to-browse page; find it by clicking the stamp, at left or anywhere else you see it on the site. That page will get updated as each new post comes out.]
Without further ado, my favorite books of 2010:
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is the bizarre story of a tobacco farmer whose cancer cells have been used in scientific research for decades after her death. The book features a rare combination of great writing, fantastic storytelling, and deep social significance. Skloot admirably weaves several storylines—Lacks’s life and death, the growth of HeLa cells, the many scientific advances those cells have made possible, the lives of Lacks’s decedents—into a cohesive and gripping book. But Immortal Life sits on top of my list because of its social importance. The story of Henrietta Lacks was a generation or two from being completely forgotten. It would have been a shame to lose this piece of our history, not just because of the scientific significance of HeLa, but also because of the perspective Lacks’s life and death adds to the Civil Rights struggle. Thankfully, with this book, Rebecca Skloot has made Henrietta Lacks truly immortal. …
Continue reading »
By Anne Leigh Parrish, on November 24th, 2010 [Original short fiction from the upcoming Chamber Four lit mag, C4. Our first issue is due out this winter; you can still submit to be included. Go here for details.]
In the Finger Lakes town of Dunston, New York, the spring rain had fallen for four straight days, and was falling again when the old man moved in. He carried one box at a time from the trunk of his Cadillac while Beau stood across the street and watched. He wondered what it would be like having an old man in the trailer park. Everyone else was younger. Beau and his wife, Eldeen, were in their twenties. The people next to them were about the same age, with four kids who slept in bunk beds in their living room. On the other side of them was a gay guy who worked at Target, and next to him was a retired cop. No one was friendly or even nice, something Eldeen often complained about.
The old man was careful as he hauled his boxes inside. Beau had seen old men like that in Iraq, setting out their fruit in the market, their veined hands slow and sure. The younger men’s hands were fast and reached his way to greet or beg, or sometimes were hidden deep in the pockets of their Western pants, which made him go quiet and cold wondering what they’d pull out.
Beau wished he had his old slingshot. Even a small rock would make a big noise on the metal siding of the old man’s trailer. The old man might hit the deck, thinking he was being shot at. That would be something to see.
The old man hauled another box to the trailer, and stumbled on the top stair. Beau laughed. He couldn’t help it. He’d always found that kind of thing funny. Once, Eldeen stumbled and he laughed for about five minutes. She didn’t talk to him then for three whole days. …
Continue reading »
By C4 Staff, on November 24th, 2010 We’re taking the rest of the week off, but before we go, we’re posting the first story from our forthcoming lit mag, C4. It’s “Comforts of Home,” by Anne Leigh Parrish, find it here.
We’re still taking submissions for the first issue, due out this winter. Go here for details. We’re also still working on a new site with a more lit mag-type design scheme; once that’s done, this and every other piece from the magazine will be posted there. And we’ll be doing an ebook and a print-on-demand edition of the magazine, much like we did with our anthology.
Pieces submitted by Dec. 1st (one week from today) will be given special attention for the first issue, but we accept submissions all the time.
Happy Thanksgiving!
By Nico Vreeland, on November 23rd, 2010 [In this feature, we highlight a handful of the best book reviews appearing over the weekend in major newspapers. Follow it here.]
 Saul Bellow: Letters, by Saul Bellow, edited by Benjamin Taylor, reviewed by John Banville (Guardian)
There are several reviews of this book floating around this week. This one is my favorite, mostly because it paints the letters as the extremely well-written precursor to E-mails from an asshole. Banville memorably quotes a letter in which Bellow eviscerates a publisher for lavishing him with not-quite-high-enough praise, and says, “It is the prickliness that makes for interest in this collection.” For another perspective, here’s the NYT review of the book, which Leon Wieseltier, a contemporary of Bellow’s, writes more as a remembrance and sketch of Bellow’s remarkable life and career.
Luka and the Fire of Life, by Salman Rushdie, reviewed by Jon Fasman (L.A. Times)
This review is funny, then irritating, then intriguing—that’s a lot to fit into 800 words. Rushdie’s latest appears to be a winning young-adult adventure story about video games. It sounds interesting, if light. The review is worth reading solely for the long quoted passage in which Rushdie describes such classics as Super Mario Bros., Sonic the Hedgehog, and Space Invaders, while coyly omitting their names. Also, the L.A. Times sometimes has outstanding original art accompanying its reviews, and that happens here.
A Very Simple Crime, by Grant Jerkins, reviewed by Patrick Anderson (Washington Post)
This grisly crime novel sounds intriguing as much for its troubles getting published (because it has no “rootable” hero) as for its constellation of dark, cold characters or its discomfiting plot. Anderson details all of that in this relatively simple review.
The Universe in Miniature in Miniature, by Patrick Somerville, reviewed by Joseph Peschel (Boston Globe)
Peschel’s review makes this collection sound like a cross between Donald Barthelme’s Sixty Stories and Italo Calvino’s Cosmicomics. Peschel says, in part: “These tales are mostly speculative fiction-science fiction, surrealism, absurdism, and fantasy blended into a metafictional continuum.” Yes, please.
OK: The Improbable Story of America’s Greatest Word, by Allan Metcalf, reviewed by Roy Blount, Jr. (New York Times)
The spelling of the word “OK” or “okay” is frequentedly a topic of debate at Chamber Four HQ. This review frustratingly doesn’t resolve the issue (although the book lands on “OK,” which I—as an OKist—record as a victory), but it’s fairly amusing to hear a few of the mythic stories of its origin, as well as the summarized breakdown of the pleasure and spread of the word. And the extravagant corollaries that the author draws from the word’s history are pretty good, too.
By David Duhr, on November 22nd, 2010
[Follow this series here. We're also compiling all our best books in one easy-to-browse page; find it by clicking the stamp, at left or anywhere else you see it on the site. That page will get updated as each new post comes out.]
I read about fifteen novels for every nonfiction title, but out of the 2010 books I read, it was two nonfiction titles that stole the show. So in slow-tease style, I’m starting with the novels.
Next, by James Hynes
I read Next just before moving to Austin, and not only did it paint for me an accurate depiction of my new city, it’s also a hell of a good novel. And funny, to boot. Kevin Quinn is a mid-level editor in Ann Arbor who flies down to Austin for a job interview without telling his maybe-pregnant girlfriend. Planted firmly in mid-life crisis mode and full of an impending sense of doom, Kevin follows an attractive young Asian girl (whom he dubs “Joy Luck”) around the city. While doing so, he reflects on his life in Michigan. This book contains two striking passages—what is probably the best sex scene I’ve ever read, and an ending so stunning and unsettling that to even hint at its contents would be sinful. Let’s just say, this writer has some heavy balls. …
Continue reading »
By Sean Clark, on November 22nd, 2010
[Follow this series here. We're also compiling all our best books in one easy-to-browse page; find it by clicking the stamp, at left or anywhere else you see it on the site. That page will get updated as each new post comes out.]
.
These best of the year posts are always a bit tricky for me. I read via a pile strategy–that is I buy books faster than even I can read them, which results in multiple stacks of books, then when I finish one I grab the next and shelve the one I read–so much of what I read has usually been sitting for about a year before I get around to reading it. Therefore, I’m left to select books from a fairly shallow pool of 2010 pubs.
Nonetheless, I read a number of very good books this year. In fact, I had a pretty tough time picking which one was tops. After a lentghy deliberation, here’s my pick for Best Book of 2010:
.
Freedom, by Jonathan Franzen
Yeah, I know, everyone is picking this book. I actually really wanted to give #1 to Amelia Gray’s excellent collection of stories, but I just can’t. Freedom is a great book, and it will stick in my head for a long time to come. Franzen’s novel is about a fairly typical American family, but it also manages to be an astute look at America itself. This isn’t the Great American Novel that you might think it would be, judging by hype it got. But it is a Great Read that’s accessible, thought-provoking, and at times quite tender. Freedom simply deserves to be called the best book of 2010. …
Continue reading »
By Sean Clark, on November 20th, 2010  To celebrate our Best Books of 2010 series, which continues Monday, we’re giving away a free paperback copy of The Chamber Four Fiction Anthology. Everyone who commented on Chamber Four this week, replied or retweet us on Twitter, or commented or like any of our Facebook posts was entered into the drawing. You can read all the story descriptions we posted through this link.
For the drawing itself, we used the tried and true method of writing names and handles on scraps of paper, and mixing them up in a hat. The winner is commenter Gaby, who took the time to comment on Sara Lehoullier’s I Loved This Book When entry on The Sun Also Rises.
For those of you who aren’t Gaby, you can buy a paperback copy of the anthology at the Harvard Book Store, and you can always download the ebook for free. We’ll probably do similar giveaways again real soon, in the meantime, check out our Best Books of 2010 series for suggestions of what to read next.
By Nico Vreeland, on November 19th, 2010 [This is the fourth installment of Armchair Detective, a C4 column about reading mysteries. Read past episodes here, or browse all our ongoing features from the Features category.]
 A mystery writer using dramatic irony to create suspense is a bit like an exterminator using napalm because somebody saw a cockroach: it works, but it’s far from the best tool for the job. Dramatic irony is especially detrimental to mystery novels, but I hate it in almost all types of fiction.
I don’t even like Jeffrey Eugenides, a talented literary author, because he’s the modern king of dramatic irony. He’s so eager to give away the plots of his novels—and the fates of his characters—that sometimes he does it in his titles, like The Virgin Suicides. I hate knowing more than the characters do about their future because it robs their decisions of risk and it makes them feel doomed, trudging unknowingly through the actions that will eventually make, say, the virgins kill themselves.
In mysteries, dramatic irony is often executed in more gimmicky, less careful ways. In a movie, it might be a panning shot that reveals, unbeknownst to the hero, an ominous goon watching him. In a book, it might be a chapter-closing zinger like, “Little did he know, he would never see his wife alive again.”
For one thing, this is a cheap way to ratchet up the suspense. More importantly, dramatic irony warps the reading experience: it tips the balance of knowledge, and creates an emotional gulf between the hero and the reader. In a mystery, that is something I never want. I want to experience everything as the character does, and that includes epiphanies, solutions to cases, and all the suspense along the way. …
Continue reading »
|
|
