Category: books

Hitchhiker’s Guide: Amazingly, mindbogglingly awful.

elvis7 Comments

I mean, you might think that The Phantom Menace was a hopelessly misguided attempt to reinvent a much-loved franchise by people who, though well-intentioned, completely failed to understand what made the original popular – but that’s just peanuts to the Hitchhiker’s movie…. It’s not even a good film if viewed as an original work: the characters are unsympathetic, the cast exhibit no chemistry, the direction is pedestrian, the pace plodding, the special effects overpowering (lots and lots of special effects, none of them funny mind you) and above all the script is amazingly, mindbogglingly awful.

MJ Simpson, Douglas Adams biographer, has posted a review of the new Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy movie.

A few key quotes:

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy movie is bad. Really bad. You just won’t believe how vastly, staggeringly, jaw-droppingly bad it is. I mean, you might think that The Phantom Menace was a hopelessly misguided attempt to reinvent a much-loved franchise by people who, though well-intentioned, completely failed to understand what made the original popular – but that’s just peanuts to the Hitchhiker’s movie. Listen.

. . . . .

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy movie is an abomination. Whereas the radio show, TV show, books and computer game are all recognisably variations on a theme, this is something new and almost entirely unrelated. It’s not even a good film if viewed as an original work: the characters are unsympathetic, the cast exhibit no chemistry, the direction is pedestrian, the pace plodding, the special effects overpowering (lots and lots of special effects, none of them funny mind you) and above all the script is amazingly, mindbogglingly awful. Oh, and they have taken most of the jokes out.

This is a terrible, terrible film and it makes me want to weep.

Wow. That’s some kinda bad. Watching the previews I cannot say I’m surprised. I can’t imagine making a decent hollywood movie out of a book where the best parts are the narrative digressions. But you’d think they could make one that would not utterly suck.

Fingers crossed that MJ’s wrong, but not holding my breath, I tell you.

Hunter

Karl Elvis1 Comment

I was at a used book convention yesterday, and one of the books I drooled over was a signed first edition of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. I didn’t buy it, of course, but damn, I wanted to.

Last night, the friend I’d gone book shopping with called me and said Looks liek you should have bought that after all, the value’s going to go up by tomorrow.

HUNTER S. THOMPSON: 1937-2005 Original gonzo journalist kills self at age 67

I guess it’s a gonzo way to go out. Still, not, so not what I wanted to read. I can’t quite process that yet.

100 best novels

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From Darrell at The Realist: Modern Library 100 best novels list. It’s a funny list, and I’m unsure if I much agree with it. Damn good conversation starter though. And if you’re a big reader (and you know you are, yeah, I’m talking to you), take a look at Darrell’s site which is dedicated to […]

From Darrell at The Realist:

Modern Library 100 best novels list.

It’s a funny list, and I’m unsure if I much agree with it. Damn good conversation starter though. And if you’re a big reader (and you know you are, yeah, I’m talking to you), take a look at Darrell’s site which is dedicated to books and reading.

CJ Cherryh — Essential Sci-fi

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CJ Cherryh is one of my favorite writers. Not just a favorite sci-fi writer, but a favorite writer overall. She’s written some of the best sci-fi novels I’ve ever read (Downbelow Station, Chanur, Cyteen, Foreigner), and some brilliant Fantasy (Fortress in the Eye of Time, Gate of Ivrel). She’s written a million books. most of […]

CJ Cherryh is one of my favorite writers. Not just a favorite sci-fi writer, but a favorite writer overall. She’s written some of the best sci-fi novels I’ve ever read (Downbelow Station, Chanur, Cyteen, Foreigner), and some brilliant Fantasy (Fortress in the Eye of Time, Gate of Ivrel). She’s written a million books. most of them good, many of them great.

Ok, she’s had a few stinkers. Hammerfall wasn’t so great, and a few of her early novels are of lesser quality. But everything she does is clever, and she’s a truly gifted writer.

She can be challenging. Her books are not easy, and tend to be grim; my friend Scorch (Who’s vanished off the face of the earth near as I can tell) described her typical scenario is “Take a character, put them in a bad situation, then have it get worse. Much, much worse“. But I find her work, all of it, to be very rewarding and worth the read.

But that’s not really what I meant to post here. What I meant to post was a link to this list, which I just found on CJ’s web site:

The Essentials: Science Fiction and Fantasy:

“So you like science fiction and fantasy, but you came in through Star Wars and have
no idea, at your first meeting with fans that have ‘been there’ a while, what they’re
talking about. You’d like to go to the conventions and understand the in-jokes and
talk the talk—and you’d like to know what this wonderful field is. I’ll give you a
list of the essential writers, the ones whose works it’s really helpful to have
read—at least enough to be in the know. Must-reads, for the concepts and/or
characters: or just to understand what the field is, and what all these books have in
common.“

I’m not completely sure I agree with every one of her picks and I think she may have left a couple out. But it’s a great list and a great starting pointg for those new to sci-fi.

Worth a look.

Book list meme

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From Analyze Julie: Directions: copy this list of ten authors, then replace any authors not in your bookcases with authors who are. Replacements in bold. Go back via Julie’s blog and keep clicking back up the trail, it’s fun to see how this list changes. Here’s mine. I have ten billion books so I tried […]

From Analyze Julie:

Directions: copy this list of ten authors, then replace any authors not in your bookcases with authors who are. Replacements in bold.

Go back via Julie’s blog and keep clicking back up the trail, it’s fun to see how this list changes.

Here’s mine. I have ten billion books so I tried to make this a cross-section; it’s not exactly representative of my collection.

1. Tim Powers
2. Charles Bukowski
3. J.R.R. Tolkien
4. Hunter S. Thompson
5. Lewis Carroll
6. Bram Stoker
7. Dashiel Hammet
8. Daniel Handler
9. James Fenimore Cooper
10. William Shakespeare

Skin and Moomin

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This is one of those ‘odd where the web can take you’ bits. Let’s trace it as it happened. Brother Ray was talking about the tattoo he’s getting. Quinn responded with a mention of Shelley Jackson’s ‘skin’ project. So I went off and googled that, and got skin.

This is one of those ‘odd where the web can take you’ bits.

Let’s trace it as it happened.

Brother Ray was talking about the tattoo he’s getting.

Quinn responded with a mention of Shelley Jackson’s ‘skin’ project.

So I went off and googled that, and got skin.

Read more “Skin and Moomin”

tis the season for my head to explode

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Oh, how I love this time of year. Fall. The leaves change (well, kinda, it’s California), Halloween starts happening (and when did Halloween get to be such a big deal? When I was a kid it was all about kids and cheap costumes – now it’s… Well, fuck it, that’s another entry), it’s no longer […]

Oh, how I love this time of year.

Fall. The leaves change (well, kinda, it’s California), Halloween starts happening (and when did Halloween get to be such a big deal? When I was a kid it was all about kids and cheap costumes – now it’s… Well, fuck it, that’s another entry), it’s no longer hot but still nice enough for motorcycle riding and driving with the top off my jeep.

But then there are the other features of fall. Pollens. Dust. My furnace back in use after being idle all summer. Allergies.

And the kids are back in school. Little petri dishes, schools. “Here, I’ve got extra snot, you want it?” Which means sinus headaches and colds. Sinus infections and coughs. Hell. At least it isn’t like when the first kid was in preschool. Start about the middle of September and that’s it, we’re all sick til spring.

Read more “tis the season for my head to explode”

The Mystic Pig

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How many books are there out there that bring you to a screeching halt? That make you stop and say ‘wow’ out loud when you read them?

The Mystic Pig by Richard Katrovas

One of — and I’m not kidding — the best books I’ve ever read. And no one’s ever heard of it.

Where to start.

How many books are there out there that bring you to a screeching halt? That make you stop and say ‘wow’ out loud when you read them?

The Mystic Pig by Richard Katrovas

One of — and I’m not kidding — the best books I’ve ever read. And no one’s ever heard of it.

Read more “The Mystic Pig”