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Booking Through Thursday: Headlines

Posted on March 17, 2011 by Walt

bookingthroughthursdaybuttonHmm … I can’t quite come up with an outright question to ask, but thinking about the theory of fiction and how it can affect and be affected by real world events can act as a buffer between the horrific events on the news and having to actually face that horror. So … what happens when the line between fiction and reality becomes all-too slim? Discuss!

We often use fiction to escape reality, or at least visit something beyond “reality,” so when the huge events of fiction happen in real life…or something from real life pops up in our fiction, it really can be a bit jarring.

dckingdomcomeIn DC Comics’ Kingdom Come—the novelization of the graphic novel, at least—there’s a scene where the main character is going about his life, and comes to realize that everyone around him is focused on a giant tv screen—where news of a nuclear explosion that’s wiped out much of Kansas is coming through.

The morning of September 11, 2001 was eerily like that for me. I got out of an early morning class, to find the entire lobby filled with people, all focused on a  single tv on a cart someone had wheeled out of an office. It was a standing crowd, and people lined the stairs, no one really talking, everyone just taking in the shocking news.

I recall coming across a quote that I believe was attributed to Grant Morrison, then writer of New X-Men:

“How close is the real world coming to the comic world?  We were talking about crazy madmen launching attacks on the world years ago.”

bttexmachinaThen there’s Ex Machina by Brian K. Vaughan…whose premiere issue brought a huge surprise twist as its cliffhanger, providing a huge “what if..?” and setting itself in an “alternate reality” from our own, splintered off based on what happened that day.

In the last several weeks, I’ve been on an Ultimate X-Men tear, reading from early in the series right up to Ultimatum in barely a week…and then realizing that I actually now own Ultimatum, reading that as part of the experience…the whole thing also filling out my knowledge from the confusion I had last year when I read about half of the Ultimate Spider-Man series.

ultimatumIn Ultimatum, a huge tidal wave suddenly strikes Manhattan, destroying it. The various heroes rally to deal with the disaster—but many of their own are lost when the “Ultimatum Wave” first hits, and many others are lost in the aftermath.

There’s also reference to Europe freezing, as it seems Magneto managed to switch the magnetic poles of the planet, and the destruction caused is world-wide.

In the Magic: The Gathering novels, the early books in the series begun in 1998 with The Brothers’ War…we find all sorts of disaster, localized and global…all of which affect the local or global culture.mtgapocalypse

Additionally, this is seen in the Dragonlance novels, where an entire continent is devastated by a “fiery mountain from the sky” that completely destroys one city, and causes a huge upheaval that changes the terrain (another city famed for its sea and ships finds itself suddenly landlocked without a sea).

Given how I’m rambling a bit here…I would really suspect it possible to write a whole series of posts, each one focusing on and digging into any of these examples individually, and so many more. I’ll probably kick myself later today as more examples come to me.

Ah, yes: The Sum of All Fears. I don’t honestly recall if I’ve read the book, but I certainly saw the movie…and I recall that freaking me out.

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Booking Through Thursday: Multi-Tasking

Posted on March 10, 2011 by Walt

bookingthroughthursdaybuttonDo you multi-task when you read? Do other things like stirring things on the stove, brushing your teeth, watching television, knitting, walking, et cetera?

Or is it just me, and you sit and do nothing but focus on what you’re reading?

(Or, if you do both, why, when, and which do you prefer?)

Very rarely, I’ll physically multitask while reading. Sometimes while I’m waiting for water to come to a boil, or waiting for noodles to boil that proper amount of time, I’ll read a couple pages in a book as able. This tends to be if I’m toward the very end of a book, incredibly involved in the book, or particularly antsy or bored with the water/noodles.

On a slightly more passive note, I’ll often read while I wait for something that’s in the microwave for more than 5 minutes, or something in the oven for awhile.

I prefer to focus on my reading and ideally have time to read a significant chunk of something in one go. If I’m reading a comic, I want to read the whole issue at once—or at least the main story if the issue has more than one story in it (such as Specials, One-Shots, Annuals, Anniversary issues, etc). If I’m reading a graphic novel or collected edition, I like to also read at least a fully issue’s worth of pages. If I’m reading a book, I prefer to be able to read at least a full chapter.

Mostly, my “multi-tasking” with books is the fact that I rarely have one finished when I start another. And through the years, I’ve found myself with dozens of books that I’ve started, but to this day have not finished. I get distracted by life, or another book, or other books, or comics, and eventually a book that’s sitting around waiting to finished will get shelved, and for the most part forgotten.

Because of more than two decades of reading comics—typically this tiny chunk of a much larger story, with at least a month between issues—I usually have very little trouble with picking a book up after weeks or even months away and simply resuming where I left off…even if I’ve read another book since putting this one down.

This tends to be the primary reason I find myself BUYING most of the books I read, and rarely obtaining them from a library. Library books have an odd feel to them for me, as I see the “due date” as a “deadline,” and a deadline implies “forced” reading, and I have trouble trying to read something that may not be IMMEDIATELY engaging, AND/or that I feel like I’m being forced to read. The library’s due date comes and goes, and being just a few pages into the book or not yet fully engaged, I’ll return it with the best of intentions of checking it out again later.

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Booking Through Thursday: Cheating

Posted on March 3, 2011 by Walt

imageDo you cheat and peek at the ends of books? (Come on, be honest.)

superman075For the most part, no. If I don’t already know the ending, I don’t want to know it ahead of time. The only reasons I really ever have to “peek at the end” of a book is to check the pagecount of the story itself (doing my darnedest to view the page number while forcing myself to NOT visually register the words on the page) or to see if there’s a “preview chapter” of some other book lumped at the end that’ll throw me off by a couple dozen pages with the true end of the book hitting too soon.

Now, the main exceptions come from graphic novels. At the bookstores or occasionally comic shops, if there’s tons of internet buzz and no one’s spoiling online, I might take a peek to see what the hype’s all about. I also have the problem occasionally with hardcovers, where I’ll remove the dust jacket so I can carry the book around and not worry about the DJ getting screwed up. Occasionally while pulling it away from the back side of the book, I’ll wind up catching a glimpse of a page or two at the back, which might grab my attention just enough to see what, exactly, is going on there.

The other primary exception comes if I’m trying to determine if I’ve already read something—such as a Star Trek novel I may or may not have read 15 years ago…I may look at the end to see if I remember it, as I have an easier time recalling endings than I do beginnings.

endersgamemmpbANECDOTE: If you’ve read Ender’s Game, you know that that has a doozy of an ending. It’s that ending that draws me back to the book on occasion (and partially influenced me on Ender’s Shadow a couple years back). Early in college, a friend was telling me about the book, and I convinced him to sum it up for me, as I didn’t see getting around to reading it. Sounded interesting, but having been told, I mentally filed it away as one of those things, and life went on.

A couple years later, for some reason or another, I happened to get a copy of the book, and got pulled in enough to read the whole thing. And I was blown away by the ending…only later realizing that this was THAT book my friend had told me about. And here I was “lucky” enough to not have made the connection, so I was still taken by surprise.

DragonsofAutumnTwilightIt’s this sort of phenomena that causes me to see re-reading books as a bit of an analogy for the time-travel experience, were it not fiction.

Having read the book, if you go back and re-read it…you’re traveling to the past, and re-joining characters who don’t yet know what’s going to happen…but as the reader…you DO know what’s going to happen. Or at least, have access to it. Of course, you can’t change what’s going to happen…but you’re aware of it.

Yet, there are details that slip away, and you might only remember the broad strokes and biggest players.

highlordskiesI’m near the end of Dragons of the Highlord Skies, and something’s just happened to a couple characters that has me on-edge, as I’d swear this isn’t something that happened to them, and I thought I remembered them doing something else. But this book delves back to a time between-pages of Dragons of Winter Night, which I haven’t actually read in a decade or more now…so I may be thinking of other characters.

Just as, if someone were to travel back 100 years…they might know big details, broad strokes…but not have any clue of what roles people play in the smaller stuff.

But I digress from the topic at hand.

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Booking Through Thursday: Real Life

Posted on February 3, 2011 by Walt

imageThe age-old “How am I going to use this in real life?” question. How would you answer it?

“How am I gonna use THIS?” That’s a pretty deep question, and certainly varies depending on the subject matter. Obviously, the context here would be “books” or “reading.” But then, it also varies on the sort of books or reading material.

untoldlegendofthebatmanThis is a comic reviews blog, so I’ll start with that—comics. There’s a Batman comic from the 1980s…The Untold Legend of the Batman (actually, 3 issues, or there’s a MMPB edition in black and white out there that I’d love to re-acquire as my copy disappeared probably 15 years ago). The first and 3rd issues have both had a profound effect on me.

In the first issue, we see a college-age Bruce attending a class on the Law. In it, a professor sets out a situation and asks what the resolution should be. Bruce disagrees with the answer and asks “But sir…is that justice?” To which the professor responds “No, Mr. Wayne—that is the Law!” And in that story, that was the moment that Bruce realized he could not simply become a police officer, but had to become something NOT bound by red tape—something that could enforce justice, even if not technically the law. And from that, I gained my own distinction between and recognition of the fact that there IS a significant difference between Justice and the Law (and there’s a whole lotta biblical stuff on that, but that’s for another discussion some other time).

In the third issue…well, there’s just a whole tone thing. Memories, how they affect someone, and how sometimes it just takes the right sort of friend or the right sort of encouragement to affect someone….and that, too, sticks with me.    (continued)

Continue reading →

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Booking Through Thursday: Heavy

Posted on January 27, 2011 by Walt

imageWhat’s the largest, thickest, heaviest book you ever read? Was it because you had to? For pleasure? For school?

05montecristoOffhand, I’m trying to think of any large/thick/heavy books I’ve read that would particularly trump any others. Probably The Count of Monte Cristo, read in high school.  Though that’s got enough years between happening and now that I don’t even recall if what I read was the unabridged version or if we read some sort of abridged version.

I imagine the Bible (NIV) might count—that’s certainly THE most significant book I’ve ever read. After years and years of it being any part of my life, several years back 04harrypotterI decided to take part in a 90-day bible-reading challenge with a local radio station…one of few such challenges I’ve ever completed.

Stephen King’s It may be a top candidate for length, read for pleasure sometime during high school. The fifth Harry Potter book—The Order of the Phoenix—also comes to mind as particularly thick.

03lesmisBack in 2004, I bought a copy of Les Miserables after developing a fascination with the Broadway musical after seeing a high school production with one of my best friends at her alma mater. Not sure I made it 50 pages in before being distracted by other stuff, and have yet to go back and finish it.

01capomnibusComic-wise, I think the first Ed Brubaker Captain America Omnibus is easily the largest, thickest, heaviest comic/graphic novel/whatever that I own. Though the Bone One-Volume Edition rivals it…but sadly, I’ve yet to get all the way through Bone.

Springboarding away from the topic at hand a bit, though….if we’d take “heavy” to mean substance and impact on a person for having read the work….I’d have to list the first 6 Left Behind novels, a number of Magic: The Gathering novels (primarily The Brothers’ War), several Dragonlance novels 02bone(primarily Dragons of Winter Night and Dragons of Summer Flame), as well as The Death of Superman, Batman: A Death in the Family, and DC’s Kingdom Come.

Of course…there’s loads I’m sure I’m not thinking of at the moment. But when you read enough….eventually one loses the ability to recall each and every thing read off the top of the head.

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Booking Through Thursday: Periodically

Posted on January 20, 2011 by Walt

bookingthroughthursdaybuttonEven I read things other than books from time to time … like, Magazines! What magazines/journals do you read??

These days, I really don’t read anything other than books or comics/graphic novels/TPBs/whatever you want to call ‘em. I suppose comics COULD be considered magazines—or periodicals. But for ME, that’s such a given, and for as much as I read traditional-format comics…the better question in that case would be what books do I read, as they’re something I read other than comics.

I’m known to dip into Reader’s Digest when I have one handy and don’t have other stuff onhand to read. I keep an issue at my desk at work in case I ever find myself without a book, so I have SOMEthing to read.

Though there are some “high end” magazine-like publications for comics, I don’t follow those, not really. I used to—years ago—read Wizard magazine…but that publication has (at least to me) fallen to such depths that I can’t even bring myself to bother reading cover blurbs if I even see the thing at all.

lifewitharchie001 Perhaps the best answer to this would be Life With Archie: The Married Life. It’s a magazine-sized publication, produced monthly. It has a few fluff features to round things out, but the heart of the publication is the presentation of two full-length comic-sized stories. One follows a future in which Archie married Betty; the other follows a future in which Archie married Veronica.

It’s a fantastic product at only $3.99…the price of a single Marvel comic, but oversized and containing two Archie comics.

And these stories—of an adult, post-college Archie—are far more relatable and relevant to me as an adult than the usual Archie fare (nothing wrong with the usual…but I’m getting to where high school was almost half a lifetime ago).

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Booking Through Thursday: Any New Year’s reading resolutions?

Posted on January 6, 2011 by Walt

bookingthroughthursdaybutton Any New Year’s reading resolutions?

Now, there’s a fairly easy one…and I actually already answered it at the turn of the year, for the most part.

1. Taking the “To Be Read” Challenge, to read at least 12 books from my to-be-read list. Books determined BEFORE 2011 started. There is a list of “alternates” that may be substituted for any of the 12.

  • The Last Days of Krypton by Kevin J. Anderson
  • The Red Pyramid by Rick Riordan
  • The Lost Hero by Rick Riordan
  • Dragons of the Highlord Skies by Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman
  • Dragons of the Hourglass Mage by Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman
  • The Wastelands by Stephen King
  • Wizard and Glass by Stephen King
  • The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown
  • Ancestor by Scott Sigler
  • Vampire a Go-Go by Victor Gischler
  • Go-Go Girls of the Apocalypse by Victor Gischler
  • Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett

2. Adopt-a-Character 2011…adopting Usagi Yojimbo by Stan Sakai. I’ve already obtained and read vol. 1, and look forward to continuing in the series. I’d have to obtain/read at least 2 per month all year to get through the ENTIRE series. While that would be awesome in its own way…it’s not likely to happen. Still, I’d love to be at least halfway through the series by the end of the year.

3. Catching up on some graphic novel reading. I’d like to finish reading Preacher (Vertigo), Annihilation and Annihilation: Conquest (Marvel), Transmet (Vertigo), Monster (Naoki Urasawa, Viz), and Ron Marz’ Witchblade (Top Cow) run.

Plus, of course, keeping up with some comics in general, and reviewing. Along with reading, I’m going to make a go at 3 1/2 seasons of Psych, as well as see how far I can get into the entire run of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel.

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Booking Through Thursday: Celebrities?

Posted on July 2, 2009 by Walt

Booking Through Thursday.

Suggested by Callista83:

Do you read celebrity memoirs? Which ones have you read or do you want to read? Which nonexistent celebrity memoirs would you like to see?

Other than blogs by comic creators/companies, not really.  Given this is Booking Through Thursday, my initial answer is “no.” At least–it’s “no” as far as super-star celebrities and such.

However, I’ve come to REALLY enjoy human/pet memoirs over the past year or so. Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World, Marley & Me, and Wesley the Owl are three of my favorite reads from the past 9 months. Each is a memoir by the author of their life with the beloved pet (cat, dog, and owl respectively).

Actually, I suppose those are–especially Marley and Dewey–celebrity memoirs.  There’s a hit movie about Marley now. And Dewey…well, the title says it all. Though “just” a library-cat in a small town…he touched the world.

And more than any celebrity, the story of Dewey’s life had a profound impact on ME. I read his story a little over a week after losing one of my cats last fall, and there was something distinctly therapeutic about reading about the life of another cat who was important to anyone. The anecdotes of his antics were far more interesting to me than anything I might read about a human celebrity.

Marley & Me: Life and
Marley & Me / Dewey / Wesley the Owl

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Booking Through Thursday: Fantasy and Sci-Fi

Posted on June 18, 2009 by Walt

Booking Through Thursday.

One of my favorite sci-fi authors (Sharon Lee) has declared June 23rd Fantasy and Science Fiction Writers Day.

As she puts it:

So! In my Official Capacity as a writer of science fiction and fantasy, I hereby proclaim June 23 Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Day! A day of celebration and wonder! A day for all of us readers of science fiction and fantasy to reach out and say thank you to our favorite writers. A day, perhaps, to blog about our favorite sf/f writers. A day to reflect upon how written science fiction and fantasy has changed your life.

So … what might you do on the 23rd to celebrate? Do you even read fantasy/sci-fi? Why? Why not?

I’m not sure I’ll do anything to ‘celebrate’…I’m not much for the “big” holidays, even.

Fantasy/Sci-Fi is the primary genre I read in.  I haven’t read many of the “classics” in Sci-Fi; Ender’s Game is probably about the most “mainstream” sci-fi I’ve read. (Then again, I’ve read a number of Star Trek novels as well…)

I’ve enjoyed the Battletech books I’ve read, and I’ve read some of the more recent (2002-ish) Mechwarrior volumes (in part due to a brief period of time involved with the Mechwarrior: Dark Age miniatures game with some friends in my college days).

I’ve mentioned the Aliens series several times in earlier BTT posts–I’ve read the novelizations of the films, and about 2/3 of the novels based on the comics, and several of the Dark Horse Comics Omnibus volumes.

Some Star Trek, Stargate, Highlander, and a Star Wars novel or two can be added to the stack; and I’m sure I’ve read plenty of other sci-fi I’m not thinking of offhand…especially from the Science Fiction and Fantasy and Tolkien and Culture courses I took my junior and senior years of college.

Fantasy-wise, I’ve read The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings; the primary series I’ve read in the genre, though are Dragonlance and Magic: The Gathering.

Comics-wise, it seems that a lot of the superhero stuff can be in one or both genres without being so overtly.  Superman involves plenty of science fiction elements (and certainly the same sort of “suspension of disbelief”) and yet would probably be classified “comics” or “super-hero” before “sci-fi.”  Ditto Green Lantern, and pretty much any of the “cosmic books” from DC or Marvel (or any smaller publisher. Runners, or the TMNT for example).

It’s also interesting to note that what was once only science fiction in some cases either IS–or is close to being–science reality.  And that while something may be fantasy, that does not render it un-real.

Now, despite my opening statement…perhaps–assuming I remember–I WILL blog on the topic in recognition of the day. Time’ll tell.

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Booking Through Thursday: Niche

Posted on June 11, 2009 by Walt

Booking Through Thursday

There are certain types of books that I more or less assume all readers read. (Novels, for example.)

But then there are books that only YOU read. Instructional manuals for fly-fishing. How-to books for spinning yarn. How to cook the perfect souffle. Rebuilding car engines in three easy steps. Dog training for dummies. Rewiring your house without electrocuting yourself. Tips on how to build a NASCAR course in your backyard. Stuff like that.

What niche books do YOU read?

As I look around this room, I don’t think I really have any niche books. In fact, with the rare exception (Cretaceous Dawn, for one–I ordered it after seeing a Facebook ad), my books fit (what I, at least, consider) mainstream genres. Next to graphic novels (will get to those in a moment), I have a bookcase devoted to Christian literature, while another bookcase is taken up with fantasy (primarily Dragonlance and Magic: The Gathering, with some Aliens and MechWarrior (sci-fi) thrown in.

Now, for the crowd I run with, comics/graphic novels are pretty common (and presumably most anyone reading my blog has at least some sort of interest in comics), but at the same time, it’s possible that comics could be considered a niche in this way.

I’ll take it one step further, and choose a specific comic series: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I’m eagerly awaiting next month’s release of TMNT Collected Book vol. 1 and the TMNT: Future Tense volume.

Already in my collection, I have a TMNT volume collecting the entire original run of Tales of the TMNT as well as 4 volumes collecting arcs from the current run of Tales of the TMNT. There’s a volume collecting Michael Zulli’s work on TMNT; a volume collecting the 2007 movie adaptation and its prequels; another collecting the first arc of the Dreamwave series based on the 2k3 cartoon. I have a new volume that collects the original TMNT Adventures mini-series from Archie; then four volumes from Tundra Publishing that collect issues 5-16 of the ongoing TMNT Adventures series. I have four volumes from FIrst Publishing that collect the first 11 issues and the Leonardo one-shot from the original TMNT series (In color!). I also have the adaptations of the first three films, and a random too-thick-to-be-just-a-comic/not-really-a-TPB volume collecting the “Return to New York” storyline.

Offhand, I don’t know of anyone else with a TMNT collection like this. A couple years ago when I attended an event featuring Ryan Brown, I opted to bring one of those Tundra TMNT Adventures volumes–I recall his being surprised, as he had never even seen these.

Point being…popular as the TMNT are in general, the comics seem far more a niche thing (it’s rare to even find the new, monthly-for-the-last-several-years Tales of the TMNT series in comic shops). So I guess they’re my niche-books.

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