Slouching Towards Bethlehem by Joan Didion
Just finished this one. It is one of the best books I've read in a long time. Collected essays from the late 60s. The one from which the book takes its title is simply amazing.
Mona Lisa Overdrive by William Gibson
Gibson has such a viscious grasp on this genre. This book takes place in the same world that his other books do. It's a world that is a bit further down the road than ours (I can't remember if he puts any dates in it) but at sometime int he past developed just a hair differently. The thing is, the difference is so little, but the "future" part is so prophetic. He nails so many things about the internet and the culture that develops around it. His divergence is in the notion that there would need to be some interface (he calls them "decks") to get someone into the internet (or cyberspace, a term Gibson coined). But he gets the cyber culture and the dangers and possibilities that the web (or Matrix in his books) brings. If you are interested in Gibson, and either don't want to start with Neuromance, or you've read it and want to try another one, I would reccomend Mona Lisa Overdrive.
2006 Best American Short Stories
Still working on it.
Aother installment in the Hellboy Saga. I've said it before, I'll say it again, as graphic novels go, this series is good. There's a good, well grounded story. Even though the characters are supernatural, they are have personalities that are not cliche.
I've been waiting to read this one for years. I haven't seen the movie, and I'm not sure I want to now. I'm afraid it will ruin the graphic novel. I can't imagine they did it justice.
Bad Twin by Gary Troupe
Ya fine, I'll fell for the marketing. But you know what.... it wasn't bad. Of course I was expecting crap that I'd have to endure to pick out a few clues for the TV show (the book is a tie in with the TV show LOST. There is no Gary Troupe). I don't read mystery novels, so maybe they are better than I give them credit for. But this one didn't suck.
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep
I've seen the movie, this was the first that I've read the book. The more Phillip K. Dick i read the more i like him. I highly recommend this, though with the warning that it is very different than the movie. The characters are different, the plot is different, and the ending is different.
Unnatural Selection by Tim Lebbon
Of all the Hellboy books I've read, this was the worst. The Hellboy novels have been my "fluff read" that I've always been able to count on. Just good fun brainless reading. A little mytholoy thrown in to set the hook, a big red guy with a heart of gold that likes to smash things, a little religious mysticism.... But this one.... this one i didn't enjoy so much.
Pirates Angus Konstam
Oddly enough, even though this was about pirates, it wasn't an easy read. I ended up taking away a decent bit of information (nothing anyone who know's spit about pirates wouldn't have know already, but i'm still trying to earn my junior eyepatch) but it was research reading it, not enjoyment.
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Quote from Mona Lisa Overdrive by William Gibson
"The mythformis usually encountered in one of two modes. One mode assumes that the cyberspace matrix is inhabited, or perhaps visited, by entities whose characteristics
correspond with the primary mythform of a 'hidden people.' The other involves assumptions of omniscience, omnipotence, and incomprehensibility on the part of the matrix itself.
That the matrix is God? In a manner of speaking, although it would be more accurate, in terms of mythform,
to say that the matrix has a God, since this being's mniscience and omnipotence are assumed to be limited to the matrix."
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