|
|
By Mike Beeman, on January 19th, 2011 Author: Karen Joy Fowler
Small Beer Press, 2010
Filed Under: Short Stories, Literary, Historical, Horror
| C4 Ratings.....out of |
10 |
| Language..... |
7 |
| Entertainment..... |
8 |
| Depth..... |
8 |
Readers familiar with Karen Joy Fowler most likely know her through her best selling novels, The Jane Austen Book Club, Wit’s End, and Sister Noon. But Fowler began her career as a writer of wildly imaginative short stories. Her newest collection is sure to add to this. What I Didn’t See is one of her strongest yet.
For some authors, a short story collections is like a science lab. The stories in this collection, published over a span of nearly two decades, show Fowler experimenting with many different styles and forms distinct from her novels. But no matter the genre or subject, the author retains what makes her full-length books so successful: an attention to detail, an ear for language, and compassion for her characters. For those who have found Fowler through her novels, these stories offer a chance to encounter an imaginative storyteller as she moves from subject to subject. …
Continue reading »
By Mike Beeman, on August 31st, 2010 [Mike had to read this book and review it because of reader votes in Junk Novel Roulette. Find more JNR here.]
 Author: Liz Carlyle
2007, Mass Market
Note: [We're not scoring or filing JNR books as reviews--that's just too mean]
Despite the deceptive title, a duke is in fact deceived by a dashing damsel in distress in this dreadful Dickensian drama. Antonia Warneham somehow deceives duke Gareth Lloyd (perhaps by forgetting to spout her back story immediately, in everyday conversation, as all the other characters do) and, boy, does she ever pay the price.
Apparently, the book is Carlyle’s warning against the damning deception of dukes, because Antonia suffers greatly for her deceit. If you deceive a duke he will do terrible things, like have sex with you while you are sleepwalking on the rampart (which is considered rape by most) and later say things like, “Let me feast my eyes on your pure English beauty” when the consensual sex actually occurs. (“Let me feast my eyes on your pure English beauty” is what a serial killer says to someone he is keeping tied up in his basement.) So take warning. After deceiving a duke, you will be subject to both his cringe-inducing constant narrative and the awkward sex that nearly, but not entirely, interrupts his babbling. And, of course, a healthy amount of “throbbing” and “thrusting.”
Along the way through the authors plodding, maddenlingly-predictable plot, Carlyle shoe-horns in themes of the time’s antisemitismby with the subtly of a jack-hammer, casually mentions Gareth’s teenage rape at the hands of some scurrilous sailors, and fails to set off even the most basic love triangle. If you were playing a drinking game to this novel by taking a sip of beer whenever you found a romance stereotype, you’d be passed out or sick in less than an hour.
John Fowles’ great novel The French Lieutenant’s Woman is, for all intents and purposes, similar to Carlyle’s novel. Both books are set in Victorian England, both concern romance between star-crossed lovers thwarted by the aristocracy and a rigid class system, and both feature main characters rebelling against their era. What’s missing from Never Deceive a Duke, though, is the character of Fowles himself. In The French Lieutenant’s Woman, Fowles’ narrator often deliniates to educates the reader on the customs of Victorian England, not only setting the story’s place in history but also countering the social sniping and stuffy Victorianism with a modern voice of reason reflecting on a socially confused time. Together, both reader and narrator shake their heads at the plight of poor Charles Smithson and Sarah Woodruff, and see them as they are: casualties of Victorian England’s moral hypocrisy.
In Never Deceive a Duke, the reader is left to provide this voice of reason for him (or, much more likely, her) self. Maybe all that’s really missing is someone to look pityingly on the two dunces in this novel, and giggle at the author’s abysmal prose. With a narrator like Fowles’ elucidating the conventions of the Romance genre, pointing to the myriad clichés as they arise, and cringing, as any modern reader does, at the mystifying dialogue, Never Deceive a Duke could be enjoyed not for the romance that it fails at conjuring, but for the unintentional comedy that so often succeeds. “Come along with me,” such a narrator might say as she takes out her scalpel to dissect this awful novel. “Let us feast our eyes on this pure B-rate beauty.”
By Mike Beeman, on May 7th, 2010  Since our last update, C4 has been hard at work screening stories for our collection, and after three weeks our project is well under way.
We asked several magazines for suggestions from their online archives, and the response we’ve received has been amazing. Combining those suggestions with our own diligent searching, we have covered much ground and our list of stories continues to grow. At this rate, we expect to have the downloadable anthology ready by mid-summer.
In our efforts to ferret out fine fiction, we’ve had a chance to pursue another long-languishing C4 goal. As a friend to readers, we are interested in highlighting the magazines that are navigating the brave new world of electronic publishing admirably. For every magazine that remains tied to the literal definition of the medium there is another literary “magazine” using their website, Twitter account, and Facebook page to bring great fiction instantly to our screens.
We’ve been compiling a list of quality sites, that includes both established voices in literature and young upstarts. We will soon be adding an online fiction resource page to complement our Best Ways To Get eBooks page. In the meantime, we wanted to take this opportunity to share our early findings. These are a few of the sites we see leading the way in delivering great new fiction. Please take a look. Browse their sites. Enjoy.
storySouth
AGNI
Boston Review
Witness
The Adirondack Review
PANK
Eclectica
Hot Metal Bridge
The Del Sol Review
Fifty-Two Stories
anderbo.com
failbetter.com
Guernica
The Collagist
(Don’t see your favorite mag on the list? Think we’d like a story? Email us! info@chamberfour.com.)
By Mike Beeman, on May 5th, 2010  The New York Times has done it again. When Michiko Kakutani savaged Beatrice and Virgil in the Times‘s regular books section, I jokingly predicted that the paper would print a second, less harsh review within two weeks. Looks like I should have put this in writing, and bet Nico five dollars. Exactly two weeks later, Robert Hanks would have made me some money.
The Hanks write-up is more of a detailed summary than a review, and the analysis is limited to two pretty tepid sentences:
Although his ambition is admirable, the literary complexity and the simplicity of feeling Martel is aiming for don’t comfortably mesh. “Beatrice and Virgil” has its rewards, but the frustrations are what stick in the mind.
Contrast that with this from the Kakutani review:
Though Virgil and Beatrice are sweetly engaging characters, the play in which they appear remains a derivative recycling of Beckett, and Mr. Martel’s efforts to turn their tale into a kind of philosophical meditation on the Holocaust result in a botched and at times cringe-making fable.
And, later
…they are another awkward element in this disappointing and often perverse novel.
These shenanigans are all too common in the Times. Akin to what reviewer Garth Risk Hallberg dubbed “The Kakutani Two-Step,” this might be called the Sunday Switcheroo. I first noticed this with Kakutani’s savage review of Jonathan Lethem’s Chronic City, which she called a “tedious, overstuffed novel” full of “a lot of pompous hot air.”
Ten days later, in the Sunday Book Review, there was this glowing review, in which Gregory Cowles calls Chronic City “turbocharged,” “astonishing,” and “intricate and seamless.”
The old switcheroo!
Imagine these quotes next to each other on the dust jacket, and you’ll see the problem.
In both reviews, I agree with Kakutani more than the apology-review that follows. But I disagree with the practice. Readers look to influential reviews in the NYT, WSJ, PW, Chamberfour, etc., to find out if a book is good first and foremost. From time to time, certain books will be controversial and warrant reviews from those who both love and hate them. Lolita is such a book, as is American Psycho and, recently, Jonathon Little’s The Kindly Ones. These seem more like back-pedaling to undercut vitriolic reviews. Readers find Kakutani’s review in the regular Arts section, where she savages the successful author, and the second piece—by an unknown reviewer in the Sunday Book Review—weeks later. Which review are we supposed to believe?
Maybe issuing conflicting reviews is a NY Times policy, but it sure is confusing to readers (not to mention how confusing it must be for the authors…”They called my book “Intricate and seamless” and “a tedious, overstuffed novel?”).
But if it works for the New York Times, it may work for C4. In the days to come, you can look for favorable reviews to off-set our least favorite books. Sean will rave about Going Rogue. Nico will put up a post touting the value of the Amish-slice-of-life genre in Plain Pursuit. And Eric Markowsky, long missing in action, will come back from retirement to praise the works of Douglas Preston. Stay tuned!
By Mike Beeman, on May 3rd, 2010 This is our last entry in the Read This Book Now series. Drop what you’re doing right now, and read John Kennedy Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces. Then read the other entries in this series here. Keep your eyes peeled for our next series, starting up this summer.
 I nearly missed out on this book for the same reason I miss out on a lot of books, movies and music: If too many people like something, part of me starts to think it must suck. I don’t know why, but if more than three people, or any one person on television, recommend something I start rolling my eyes. Maybe it’s because I think that if something appeals to everyone it must be so watered-down and vanilla that people with no taste at all can enjoy it. The point is, I’m usually wrong and miss out on cool things. For this reason, I heard about A Confederacy of Dunces long before I read it. A friend demanded I read Confederacy repeatedly, and after finally reading it, I’m ashamed to say how long he badgered me before his recommendation took. So if you haven’t read this book for the same reason, do yourself a favor and get a copy. You won’t be sorry. …
Continue reading »
By Mike Beeman, on April 27th, 2010  Author: Yann Martel
2010, Spiegel & Grau
Filed Under Literary
| C4 Ratings.....out of |
10 |
| Language..... |
6 |
| Entertainment..... |
0 |
| Depth..... |
4 |
I feel conflicted about about panning this book. I really didn’t want to. I wanted to love Beatrice and Virgil (although when I heard Martel describe his next project as “a conversation taking place between two animals on a shirt,” I cringed). I did not let the many acerbic reviews it received everywhere stop me from buying the book because I felt that, as a fan of his other work, I owed it to the author and myself to find out first-hand. I loved Life of Pi. I loved Martel’s short story collection,The Facts Behind the Helsinki Roccamatios, which I bought immediately after reading his Booker Prize winning novel. If you haven’t read either, do yourself a favor and grab them. And if you enjoy them, too, do yourself another favor and stop right there. …
Continue reading »
By Mike Beeman, on April 14th, 2010  To celebrate the one year anniversary of our website, C4 will be putting together an anthology of electronic fiction published in the time we’ve been online. We’ve done a lot of reviewing and commenting in the past year, and this is our way of engaging in the literary world as contributors as well as critics. The future of ereading is too exciting to sit back and watch, and we’ve been watching too long. An anthology is our first step in participating.
The C4 Anthology has two objectives:
1) We will highlight work published electronically in the last 15 months. We love paper magazines, but we are interested in spotlighting writing that reaches readers through the Internet. Electronic texts are far more versatile when considering the variety of different ways you can read a website: laptops, desktops, cell-phones, flat-screen televisions—and never mind the slew of ereaders. The chance for a wide readership is exponentially greater once a story is published online, especially if it doesn’t land in one of the handful of household-name literary magazines. Although not all literary magazines offer free full-length stories yet, many are catching on to the idea, and doing their writers a great service. We will be looking at these forward-thinking journals and websites for our complilation.
2) We will publish our anthology in DRM-free formats, thus allowing the authors to reach the widest possible audience. It will be available free of charge. We’ve been writing about the frustration of wading through a mishmash of formats and DRM, navigating sharing restrictions, and facing a general lack of availability in ebooks all year long, so we came up with a solution: an anthology of quality fiction made available in open format for free (PDF and ePub versions are currently planned).
Right now our crack team of contributors is diligently combing the many websites that meet our standards of offering full-length, high-quality fiction. Over the next few months we will be collecting the most promising pieces, and shaping and designing our first anthology. We can promise it will be beautiful and packed with juicy fiction. Will keep updated as the collection comes together.
-Team C4
P.S. Have a story to suggest? We’d love to read it. Email us the hyperlink.
By Mike Beeman, on April 1st, 2010  A galley proof of Gravity's Rainbow pulled from the Salinger 'Vault.' Every day our team of dedicated sleuths diligently scours the web for book-related news, and today we stumbled across a startling discovery. After decades of speculation, the fabled “Fiction Vault” of J.D. Salinger was briefly opened to a select number of friends, relatives, and creditors of the late, great author. Using an iPhone, one anonymous viewer managed to snap a few pictures. Although he or she only managed low-quality images of the cover pages of a few manuscripts, these are sure to be the most telling and conclusive blurry photos of American lore since Roger Patterson captured his definitive photo of Big Foot in 1967. The pics were routed through Romania, from there sent to a cyber-cafe in Seoul, South Korea, smuggled on a flash drive to Ka, Turkey, and finally traded for 100 units of gold in the game World of Warcraft to a California resident known only by his screen name, “Noobzilla.” The pictures Noobzilla released speak for themselves.
The first picture reveals a rough draft of Gravity’s Rainbow, a novel previously attributed to reclusive author Thomas Pynchon. This finally proves the long-speculated conspiracy theory that Thomas Pynchon is actually one of the earliest pen names of the reclusive Salinger. But the surprises are far from over. …
Continue reading »
By Mike Beeman, on March 11th, 2010  Edited by Dennis Lehane
Akashic Books, 2009
Filed Under: Thrillers, Short Stories, Mystery
| C4 Ratings.....out of |
10 |
| Language..... |
7 |
| Entertainment..... |
8 |
| Depth..... |
6 |
The Boston Noir collection marks our fair city’s induction in the roving city-themed noir series, “Book Noir,” from Akashic Books. Already the series has seen collections from Brooklyn, San Francisco, Baltimore, and Phoenix, among others. Dennis Lehane is an obvious choice as editor -I’d be be hard-pressed to come up with a close second in terms of Boston crime novelists. He proves a smart choice, as well, and has put together a collection of noir stories as he defines them: working-class tragedies. In this collection, Lehane explores not only crime, or, as he calls it “skuzzy people doing skuzzy things to other skuzzy people,” but explores what the Boston means to the people who live in, and more often just-outside, New England’s second-place city. …
Continue reading »
By Mike Beeman, on January 11th, 2010 Keep up with the rest of this series here.
I distrust the idea of books/movies/albums “of the year” because the fact of something being published/released/produced in a particular calendar year seems pretty irrelevant. Each year-end finds us with lists of books that are supposed to represent the previous year period in some way, but even the most reflexive author has a pretty slim chance of writing and publishing a book within one year. Most of my “books of the year” were probably completed in 2007, at the latest (and in case of translations, were written much earlier).
The idea that any reader can find the “top books” of a year suggests that they have read and evaluated every book that has been published, has always seemed pretty is impossible, too. So, in the end, we are left with a random and subjective list of books one person happened to enjoy, and my addition to the “best of ’09″ genre is certainly made in that spirit. …
Continue reading »
|
|
