Pop Culture Book Review

WHAM-O Super Book

2008-11-10T18:17:00.004-06:00

Tim Walsh is a game inventor, documentary film maker, toy historian, consultant and author. His latest book is WHAM-O Super Book: Celebrating 60 Years Inside the Fun Factory. This book has lots of great stories behind Spud Melin and Rich Knerr's toy company WHAM-O and their "fun factory". You'll know this company for their famous inventions like the Hula-Hoop, Frisbee, Silly String, Super-Ball, Hacky Sack, Slip 'n Slide and my personal fav the Bubble Thing. Did you know that Play-Doh began as a wallpaper cleaner created by a soap company? WHAM-O once created a do-it-yourself bomb shelter? troops in Iraq might be using Silly String to detect trip wires? Thanks to this book, now you know. There are lots of interesting stories combined with tons of classic ads and pictures to inform you about all things WHAM-O. Walsh is witty and since he's reporting on a fun subject, he finds lots of exciting stories to tell. A section on the failed toys developed by the company over the years was particularly interesting. The WHAM-O company makes for fun stories and this book is a great showcase for some of the best and most fun toys lots of us played with when we were kids.

VOTE

2008-11-04T16:46:00.002-06:00

Ok readers - if you haven't voted yet DO IT! Fulfilling your civic duty is important and chances are you'll get a fun little sticker you can wear when you're done.

Anxiously Awaiting Paper Towns

2008-10-12T15:47:00.001-05:00

Hey there readers, remember me? Since moving to Missouri, I have been quite busy. I keep meaning to update... Today is a new day though. I had an extremely successful trip to Target this morning where I got purple dress shoes and a wine rack for $10 each, now I'm at work enjoying a day filled with interesting reference questions. Plus, it's fall and gorgeous outside. I've been overtaken by a particularly good mood.

Let's get to the reviews:

Breaking Dawn, as you know unless you're not a Twilight fangirl, is the last book in the Twilight series by Stephenie Meyer. I've read the whole series and even though I'm Team Jacob, I have enjoyed it...sort of. If I were 15, I know that I'd love this series, be obsessed and wish that I too had a sexy vampire boyfriend. Since I'm past that idealistic age, I get rather offended by the way the "love" story is portrayed and think it's more than unrealistic. The finale is a great wrap up and pretty much gives the reader everything they want to see. A big battle at the end secures the characters' futures just as they want them and no one is left disappointed or dead, like in the finale to Harry Potter, a far superior series. It will be interesting to see how the Twilight series does as movies starting with the release of Twilight next month.

My love for the Green brothers has been documented on this blog before. Next week sees the release of John Green's new book, Paper Towns. I am super excited for it and also excited that I will be able to attend a stop on John's book tour. Check out Paper Towns if you get a chance.

Lately, I mention television shows on this blog that I like. Since moving, I have a Netflix membership and have been enjoying various shows. I tried to get into Sports Night again, but just couldn't for some reason. I love Josh Charles because his character Knox from Dead Poets Society is pretty much my dream man. I also love Peter Krause because of his work in Six Feet Under and Dirty Sexy Money. The show just didn't appeal to me now; it might be the out-of-place laugh track or the 90s feel, but I just couldn't get into it. Instead, I've moved to Pushing Daisies creator Bryan Fuller's first show Wonderfalls. It's really kooky, but fun and interesting. A 24-year-old slacker with a philosophy degree from Brown is working at a souvenir shop next to Niagara Falls. Small figurines start talking to her and if she doesn't do what they say, bad things happen. Her eccentric family and friends make the show interesting and I'd definitely recommend it if you're a Pushing Daisies fan and a Lee Pace fan. And come on, who isn't?

As the presidential election looms closer, I feel compelled to urge you to vote. Check out Project Vote Smart for information on the candidates.

Thanks for reading. I'll try to keep up better than I have been, but with a trip to WI and a conference in Orlando on the horizon; that may not happen. Best Wishes!

Many Changes

2008-07-31T12:55:00.001-05:00

Hello dear readers. I haven't updated in a while and I'm sorry. I'm in the process of a big change in my life - I've moved from Madison to Missouri for a new job as an academic librarian. I'm getting settled in and so far I'm very happy here. Unfortunately, the public library here is lacking in books about popular culture. That's putting it very mildly; if I wanted to read Nicholas Sparks' The Choice, I could pick from any of their five copies, but I certainly can't find excellent books like I normally discuss on here. While I figure out how to change that, I'll leave you with some books I wish I could review and other things you may find interesting.

Stuff White People Like: A Definitive Guide to the Unique Taste of Millions by Christian Lander. Based on the popular blog of the same name, this book details the taste of white people. Some of my favorite entries: Scarves, New Balance Shoes, Graduate School and the best one ever - Knowing What's Best For Poor People. Oh white people...

When I moved, I had to cancel my hold on I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell by Tucker Max. Apparently he expects us to believe that's his real name and he didn't just change around his first and last name to sound more fratty. Anyways, this book mostly consists of stories where Max talks about what an asshole he is. Mission accomplished, buddy. His website is similar and can be found here.

Speaking of so bad it's good, I saw Mamma Mia! last night. As you can tell by the exclamation point at the end of the title, this is a musical. It was wonderfully cheesy and there were plenty of times where I actually laughed out loud; most of these times occurred when Pierce Brosnan was singing. He was unintentionally (or maybe intentionally...hmmm...interesting tactic, Brosnan) hilarious. I was also quite impressed with Amanda Seyfried. She has a great voice and it was nice to see her play a character with depth, much different from ditzy Karen in Mean Girls or reckless Lilly Kane in Veronica Mars. Her acting talent in this movie makes me think I should watch more Big Love.

Lastly, Veronica Mars. What an amazing show. People always tell me I'd like it and in the last month or so I've burned through the first two seasons like it's my job. I LOVE it. The writing is so smart and Veronica is hilarious. Having a season-long mystery is a great formula; it keeps you guessing while not dragging on and on (LOST, anyone?). I scored the third season at the used bookstore in my new town for cheap so I'm currently going through that one. I'll leave you with one of my favorite lines so far:

Logan: Guess who I saw on campus today?

Veronica: Some girl going wild? As I understand it, it happens all the time in college. I'm on the verge of it right now.

Candy Everybody Wants

2008-07-02T12:07:00.004-05:00

Josh Kilmer-Purcell's first book, memoir I'm Not Myself These Days was a great read. This summer marks the arrival of Kilmer-Purcell's first novel Candy Everybody Wants. This book starts in my home state; main character Jayson Blocher is growing up gay in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin in the 1980s. He describes himself not as gay, but instead as "a Phil Donohue guest". After filming his own soap opera, Dallasty!, Jayson's masterpiece is aired during a senior class party and his onscreen kiss with neighbor and friend Travis causes a major controversy. Jayson's mom sends him away to New York City to live with his father, a gay actor who has no idea Jayson exists. While there, the protaganist encounters a gay prostitution scandal, falls in love with a child TV star, gets involved in show business, escapes arrest, goes on the lamb and deals with homelessness. If that sounds like a lot, it is. This book packs in the drama and unlikely situations, but it's all fun. I did not enjoy this as much as Kilmer-Purcell's memoir, but it was a good summer read.

The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks

2008-06-23T22:26:00.003-05:00

A while ago, I read Dramarama by E. Lockhart and enjoyed it immensely. Her newest book manages to be even better. The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks is the story of a prep school junior who doesn't want to be known by her childhood nickname "Bunny" anymore. Frankie feels it's time for people to start taking her seriously. As the school year goes on, she grows more and more obsessed with the secret society her boyfriend Matthew has joined at school, the Loyal Order of the Basset Hounds. Instead of taking no for an answer when he acts like it doesn't exist, Frankie takes matters into her own hands. She starts sending emails to the group disguised as their fearless leader and ends up becoming somewhat of a criminal mastermind by making the Order carry out large scale pranks against the school, students and mascots.

I came away feeling like all teen books for girls should be written like this one. E. Lockhart perfectly captures the feelings of a female trapped in a male culture and puts a really interesting spin on the power dynamics. Her views on prep school were also interesting. A friend commented that the book "perfectly explained the annoying, rich boy sense of entitlement and security in one's superior social standing that made Logan and the last season of Gilmore Girls totally stupid." I couldn't agree more. Lockhart makes Frankie into the kind of feminist we should all strive to be and that makes this book excellent.

Attack of the Theater People

2008-06-10T13:25:00.000-05:00

It's been a long time since my last post and I'm sorry. I could make excuses, but I won't. Now it's time to get back to the book reviews. I've got a few to get us started again.

When I first started this blog, I reviewed a book called How I Paid For College: A Novel of Sex, Theft, Friendship & Musical Theater. Recently, I was lucky enough to read the sequel, Attack of the Theater People by Marc Acito. This novel finds our hero Edward Zanni let go from Juilliard for being too "jazz hands". In his usual madcap fashion, Edward ends up taking odd jobs around New York City to pay the bills. Working as a party motivator for bar and bat mitzvahs nets Edward a 13-year-old stalker and a few secret identities including one as a British MTV VJ. Not that MTV exists in Britain, but no matter for Edward as long as the kids are entertained. The same cast of characters from How I Paid for College is back: Edward's friend Paula is stuck at Juilliard playing the grandmother in every show and staying in character far too long after she exits the stage. Doug, Paula's ex-boyfriend, is the lead singer in a Bruce Springsteen cover band and their pal Natie is up to his philandering ways losing Edward's money in the stock market. It's the 80s in New York and the adventures are just as loud and crazy as the neon suits. I loved this book.

Unfortunately for Indiana Jones fans, the new movie has not gotten the greatest reviews. Although I have not seen it yet, I have become an expert in all things Indiana Jones thanks to The Indiana Jones Handbook: The Complete Adventure Guide by Denise Kiernan and Joseph D'Agnese. I now know how to handle awkward foods, escape if I'm entombed accidentally, handle poisonous snakes, use a bull whip (whip it good), run on top of a moving train and blend in when I find myself in unfamiliar surroundings. This book is a cool take on an adventure guide and I like the movie tie-ins. Although I'm getting to it late and the movie has already come out, this book is worth taking a look at.

Now for a few movie notes. My favorite movie of all time is When Harry Met Sally which I'm watching right now. It's been far too long since I've seen it and it's still just as wonderful as when I saw it the first time at age 13. Recently I saw Forgetting Sarah Marshall, it was great. It was funny, but also had a lot of heart. Plus, Jason Segel is adorable and his character is writing a musical. It can't get much better than that. On the other side of the spectrum, I caught the Sex and the City movie and totally hated it. I thought it was too long, not funny and generally misogynistic. I was a fan of the show, despite hating Mr. Big and thought the movie lost the wit and sassiness of the TV show.

I'm glad to be back and hope you're happy to read more. Thanks for sticking with me, dear readers. That means you, Mom :)

Go Fug Yourself

2008-04-13T22:35:00.002-05:00

I've documented my long standing love for Television Without Pity in this blog before. Although most of the original crew have flown the coop since Bravo bought them out and their new interface is ridiculous, I do still love their site. When I first started reading, Jessica was the recapper for Dawson's Creek and she did a wonderful job documenting the hatred we all felt for Dawson. I still go back occasionally and read her recaps which contain wonderful sentiments about Pacey and Joey like, "And then he reaches up and kisses her. Aw. Aww. Eee! EEEE! Aw. Ahem."

Eventually, I found out that Jessica (Morgan) and Heather Cocks, another recapper, wrote the best blog ever: Go Fug Yourself. They post pictures of celebrities at events and make fun of them. It's awesome. As luck would have it, they've just written a book called Go Fug Yourself presents The Fug Awards. The first award is titled Girl, Please and it only gets better from there. Chloe Sevigny wins the Bronzed Uggs for the first award, and rightly so. Clay Aiken is up for Male in Most Imminent Peril and I must agree. He frightens me so very much; they describe his new-ish look as two parts Paul Reubens, one part k.d. lang. Indeed. Sadly, Rupert Grint is also nominated in this category. Oh Ron...you should have stuck with the sweaters Mrs. Weasley knit for you for Christmas. The book goes on to make fun of Tyra Banks' hair, Tara Reid's plastic surgery, Fergie's lack of fashion sense and also rag on their favorite targets. Bai Ling, Sienna Miller, Paris Hilton, Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan all get their proper face time during the awards. The book is fabulously funny and some of the outfits are truly horrifying. And, as always, Heather and Jessica add their signature snide and snarky commentary that includes references to Dynasty and Passions. Oh Passions, I miss you almost as much as I loved this book.

Cheer!

2008-04-06T23:30:00.003-05:00

When I got my room assignment for my dorm my freshman year of college, I was so excited. Imagine my surprise when I moved in and my roommate proceeded to cover her half of the room with cheerleading memorabilia from high school. I got to help her practice for a try-out with the spirit squad and deal with the reaction when she didn't make it. I only knew about cheerleading from Bring It On and was not exactly prepared for the *clap* "Ready, OK?!" that came out of her mouth in normal, everyday situations.

Amazingly, my experience was nothing compared to the extremely dedicated college cheerleaders that appear in Cheer!: Three Teams on a Quest for College Cheerleading's Ultimate Prize. Author Kate Torgovnick follows the Memphis All-Girl Tigers, the Stephen F. Austin University Lumberjacks and the Southern University Jaguars in this well-written and extremely informative book. After a very interesting history of cheerleading, Torgovnick introduces the three teams at try-outs and follows them through to various National competitions. The author is clearly passionate about her subject and that shines through in her writing. Although readers may have many stereotypes about cheerleading, Torgovnick shows that this is a sport worthy of our attention. The drama is real because the stakes are high for these dedicated athletes. I really enjoyed this book and was amazed at how fast I got sucked in to the stories of the men and women on these three teams. It's always exciting to find a subject fascinating when you never thought you'd even like it.

Author: Seth Rudetsky

2008-03-12T23:58:00.010-05:00

I have become such a huge fan of Seth Rudetsky. The more obsessed I become with Broadway, the more I realize that he's even more obsessed than I am and I love it. I think that Broadway needs people like Seth who keep the awe and love in their work.

Two days ago I got The Q Guide to Broadway: stuff you didn't even know you wanted to know about the hits, flops, the Tony's, and life on the wicked stage written by Seth Rudetsky who has more jobs than it seems is humanly possible: piano player extraordinaire, music director, conductor, actor, writer, comedian, host of Seth's Broadway Chatterbox, host of Sirius Satellite Radio's Seth's Big Fat Broadway and star of his own one man show. After finishing The Q Guide, I realized that this book is my new bible; I'm like Kathy Griffin with her Emmy Award. It doesn't hurt that I got it on inter-library loan from...wait for it...the Library of Congress! (You may know if you read this blog often that I am very anti-exclamation point, but when it comes to my two favorite things colliding - Broadway and libraries, it certainly deserves an exclamation point.) This book really does tell you everything you need to know and it was fun to read it after reading Seth's novel because you see similar stories in each. I enjoyed the cast recording recommendations, the show histories, the love for high belting leading ladies and the quizzes at the end of each chapter. Every once in a while I'd have to stop reading and go to YouTube to watching something mentioned in the book, it was super fun. My only complaint is that it was too short, I wanted more dirt and high Es when it ended.

Late last year, Seth's roman a clef, Broadway Nights: A Romp of Life, Love and Musical Theatre came out. It finally arrived at my library last week and I read it all last weekend. It follows substitute piano player Stephen Sheerin as he becomes the music director for a Broadway show called Flowerchild created by his friend Mason. The novel is written in the form of Stephen's diary that he's supposed to be writing for his therapist whose name is Monikah. Stephen can't quite get over the K in her name and makes fun of it throughout the book which is quite entertaining. The cast of characters in the novel include Stephen's friend Jackson and his annoyingly pompous boyfriend Ronald as well as Stephen's boyfriend Craig who has another boyfriend waiting at home. Once the show starts coming to fruition, the drama kicks in (ba da bum) and the book gets really good. It's filled with wonderful theatre stories and crazy things happening with the show at every turn. All ends well for Stephen, but you have to read to find out how... I just have to say:

Thank you Seth Rudetsky. (That's a musical shout out - anybody?)

How They Met, and Other Stories

2008-03-04T23:24:00.005-06:00

So I've come to the conclusion that I have hardly any time left to read after school, work, practicum, job applications and attempting to have a life. Because of this, I need to read fluffy stuff since not reading is definitely not an option. The nice thing about teen fiction is that it isn't fluffy stuff. A lot of Young Adult novels are wonderful literature that have fresh new ideas and I'm discovering more and more how much I love it.

A few weeks ago I reviewed David Levithan and Rachel Cohen's second book, Naomi and Ely's No Kiss List. David Levithan's newest book, written on his own, is How They Met, and Other Stories; a collection of short stories about love. Some of these stories are cute and funny while some are serious and deal with longing and loneliness. I really enjoyed this book and thought that all of the stories were really well written and some were surprisingly thought-provoking. I would recommend this collection to anybody and even though Valentine's Day has passed us by, it's still nice to read about love.

Shortcomings

2008-02-25T00:31:00.004-06:00

First, I have to thank everybody who congratulated me on my 100th post. Steve on Broadway! He's one of the greatest Broadway bloggers out there and he wrote to congratulate me - how cool am I? My friends and coworkers who wrote in, thanks to you also. You're no famous Broadway blogger, but I appreciate you all the same :)

A few coworkers recommended the graphic novel Shortcomings by Adrian Tomine. It was great. Since it's a graphic novel, it was a really fast read which is perfect for my limited reading-for-pleasure time. The illustrations were incredibly well done and could sustain the story even when there was no dialogue. The story centers around Ben Tanaka and his girlfriend Miko who are weathering a separation when Miko moves to New York from the Bay area. Ben's friend Alice acts as his support system during this separation and her character really made the book for me. She was the perfect antidote to Ben's incessant complaining. The book looks at race with a really sharp eye, but manages to be on point about lots of pop culture issues and still made me laugh. Although I havent' been very eloquent in my review, I highly recommend this one and you'll agree when you read it.

Happy 100th Post!

2008-02-06T17:41:00.000-06:00

I am happy to report that this is post number 100 on Pop Culture Book Review. I started this blog back in August of 2006 and I know that I don't update it nearly enough, but I love writing reviews and getting feedback from my readers. Thank you all so much for contributing to my longevity. For my super exciting 100th post, I'm going to discuss lots of stuff that I've come across in the last few weeks:

I read the very cute gay epistolary novel Almost Like Being In Love by Steve Kluger. This book was so much fun because it references lots of musicals while telling a love story in an exciting style that made it fun to read.

Urban Dictionary just released their second volume entitled Mo' Urban Dictionary: Ridonkulous Street Slang Defined which is just as exciting as the first volume. It's both handy and funny - what more could you want? An aside: ridonkulous makes me think of the episode of How I Met Your Mother when Marshall goes to brunch with his law school friend Brad who describes the zucchini bread as ridonkulous. He he he. Also of note in How I Met Your Mother related news, the red-band R rated trailer was released yesterday for Jason Segel's movie Forgetting Sarah Marshall that comes out in April of this year and it's pretty funny.

Finally, I am super excited to get Seth Rudetsky's new roman a clef titled Broadway Nights: A Romp of Life, Love & Musical Theatre. I will let you guys know how it is once it finally arrives on hold for me. If you are a Broadway fan, I suggest watching Seth's videos since he is hi-larious. I especially love his rant about Barbara Walters and her musical stylings it made me laugh out loud.

So there you have it - hopefully you found something you liked and thanks again for helping me get to post #100. Here's to the next 100.

Author: Maureen Johnson

2008-01-21T23:10:00.000-06:00

John and Hank Green's Brotherhood 2.0, which I've mentioned here before has been instrumental in my sudden obsession with YA lit. I know I've posted mostly reviews of teen fiction here lately, but I can't get enough. Maureen Johnson is an author who is also a nerdfighter (and has the same name as Idina Menzel's character in RENT, so she's bound to be awesome). Johnson's books, at least the three that I've read so far, are wonderful. I first read The Bermudez Triangle, a novel of three best friends who must deal with two of the girls falling in love with each other. I then read The Key to the Golden Firebird, the story of three sisters dealing with their father's death. Finally, I read Devilish, the story of a girl who sells her soul to the devil. Johnson has two more novels published and another one coming out this year. The best thing about these books is the characters, all of the young women find their inner strength and make it through tough situations. Not only are the girls strong, these books are funny and smart. The sub-plots are just as interesting and fun as the main plots and I would recommend any one of the above books as well as her others. Come into my teen fiction web...

The Daring Book for Girls

2008-01-05T16:38:00.000-06:00

I've missed you all, I've been horribly neglectful of my blog and I'm sorry. Readers, it's good to be back.

First there was The Dangerous Book for Boys by Conn and Hal Igguiden, then the parody The Dangerous Book for Dogs by Rex and Sparky. Luckily, now the ladies get their due with The Daring Book for Girls by Andrea J. Buchanan and Miriam Peskowitz. First of all, I'd like to say that I'm very happy this book isn't pink. Instead, it's something a hundred times better: light blue and sparkly. I know that's a small thing and you shouldn't judge a book by it's cover, but it makes me happy.

Say you wanted to know the rules for bowling, how to make a tree swing, how to be a spy, or a short history of women Olympic firsts. You could find out all of those things and more in this really well done and handy reference book. This is the book you needed when you and your friends were trying to figure out how to whistle with two fingers at your first basketball game. It's awesome and has lots of cool stuff in it that you don't even realize you need to know. Like, does anyone actually know how to play Jacks? I sure don't remember, but this book will tell me. Thanks to Miriam and Andrea for making all of us girls a bit more daring and more importantly, well informed.

Naomi and Ely's No Kiss List

2007-12-10T12:35:00.000-06:00

Rachel Cohen and David Levithan's first book, Nick and Nora's Infinite Playlist is currently filming the movie version starring the adorably awkward Michael Cera and superfly Kat Dennings. I had that book home forever and just never got around to it, although now I'll have to since I'm sure the movie will be excellent. Instead, I started with Cohen and Levithan's second book together, Naomi and Ely's No Kiss List. This young adult novel tells the story of a pair of extremely tight childhood friends and neighbors, straight beauty Naomi and gay legend-in-his-own-mind Ely. After a falling out that's caused by Ely kissing Naomi's boyfriend Bruce, their friendship seems to be over. This novel is in a format where each chapter is narrated by a different person, sometimes it's Gabe, the doorman who wants to date Naomi, sometimes it's Naomi's friend Robin (girl) or Robin (boy). Sometimes it's Bruce (the second, of the previously mentioned kiss) or Bruce (the first, a high school boy Naomi loves to lead on). Although this sounds confusing, it's not bad and the multiple narrators work to tell a great story. The separation makes both main characters realize what they may have sacrificed for their friendship and how that must change so that they can move on. I know I've been reviewing lots of YA lit lately, but it's all good stuff and my future-teen-librarian friend always has the best recommendations, so I gotta see them through.

I Love You, Beth Cooper

2007-12-03T22:55:00.000-06:00

Larry Doyle's novel I Love You, Beth Cooper has been on my reading list for a while and is one of those books that I keep starting, giving up for something else (like the entire Twilight series) and then picking up again. This book is entertaining and harkens back to a high school life that is overblown, yet still recognizable. After all, someone sings Green Day's Good Riddance (Time of Your Life) at the graduation ceremony. The main character Denis starts the book by announcing in his valedictorian speech that he has been in love with popular, pretty cheerleader Beth Cooper all throughout high school. He mentions that it all started when he sat in the back of Spanish class, telling Beth and the whole school, much to their amusement, "I have loved you from behind.." This confession of love is complicated by Beth's large and emotionally disturbed boyfriend Kevin who spends much of the rest of the book trying to beat Denis up. Beth's friends aren't much help to poor Denis either. Ironically, Denis's best friend Rich, although endlessly entertaining, is too busy quoting memorable movie lines to assist his friend in matters of the heart. With lots of action, great movie quotes starting each chapter and extremely witty dialog, this book is worth checking out.

A Few Things

2007-11-27T00:18:00.000-06:00

So I took last week off in order to properly celebrate Thanksgiving. I hadn't read anything good anyway and it was best to not bore you with a lackluster book review. Plus, I had to participate in the best family Thanksgiving tradition ever: tequila shots.

I'm going to mention a few things today. First off, I've started watching a new program that's being broadcast online in a few different places called quarterlife. It's by Marshall Herskovitz who produced one of the best shows ever, My So-Called Life. So far I've only watched 3 parts of the first episode but I'm hooked. It's about a magazine editor who really wants to be a writer and her video blog that exposes the secret desires of all of her friends. It's kind of trashy, but that's what makes it good. Plus, with the producers still stupidly holding their ground and the writers still (rightfully) striking, I miss television.

This past weekend I read the latest PostSecret book, A Lifetime of Secrets. It was basically the same as the last two books, some of the secrets I had seen before and some were new. The overall tone of the book was depressing; in fact, some of the secrets were almost unbearable. It's easier to take the blog that only posts 10 secrets once a week. A whole book of them was just too much.

A few weeks ago someone nicely commented on my review of Madlands by J. Allen Kirsch and mentioned that there was a sequel. I was not aware of this so I requested God's Little Isthmus immediately. Unfortunately, when I sat down to read it I was fairly disappointed. Everyone was so Madison: liberal, environmentally conscious and a do-gooder to the extreme. Now I like to think that I am all of those things, but in moderation. I'm not going to stop drinking a beer that I like just because it happens to be owned by the same company as another product that is doing something borderline bad. Maybe it was just my mood, but this sequel rubbed me the wrong way. Perhaps I'll try it again some time, but right now, it's not for me.

The Beloved Son

2007-11-12T17:59:00.000-06:00

I read Jay Quinn's gay fiction book Back Where He Started a few years ago and really liked both the story and the writing of this novel that details the break up of a long term relationship and what happens to the grown children in the process. Last year Quinn came out with another novel titled The Good Neighbor which I was not really a fan of, I thought it felt rushed and didn't think it was the same quality of story. That novel details the ever-growing relationship between one half of a gay couple and a neighboring husband and father. Despite not loving his last book, when I found out Quinn was coming out with another novel I got on the hold list right away for The Beloved Son. I figured that The Beloved Son would be written in a similar style, but it wasn't. Quinn still brought good writing to this story and I definitely enjoyed it, the difference was that this time Quinn employs a straight male narrator. The Beloved Son is the story of Karl Preston and his gay brother Sven's role reversal as they have the take care of their parents and deal with their mother's mounting dementia. I loved the family dynamics in this story and thought that Quinn dealt very well with presenting the story from both Sven, who lives in the same city and is a primary caretaker for his mother yet disliked by his father, and Karl, who lives far away and has only seen the "good face" of his family until the weekend during which this book takes place. Karl's wife and daughter join Sven, his partner and their parents for a big family get together weekend and the novel is divided into each day of the weekend rather than into chapters. In an interview, Quinn did mention that this book might appeal to a larger audience than his other books, and that's true, but that's not why I liked it. It was Quinn's fair and nuanced portrayal of a family in turmoil that made this a great read.

I Am America (And So Can You!)

2007-11-05T23:20:00.000-06:00

I've been horribly neglectful of my blog lately. Lots of stuff is going on and on top of it all I'm sick which is really annoying. But, I'm back with a vengeance, a vengeance to take lots of Emergen-C, get better and of course read awesome books.

So Stephen Colbert...it's hard to come up with something original to say about him these days since he's already said it all himself. We all know the guy is his own biggest fan. I was lucky enough to get on the hold list early for his first book, winner of the Stephen T. Colbert Award For The Literary Excellence, yes that's right, I Am America (And So Can You!) by Stephen Colbert. This book is a patriotic look through Stephen's eyes at issues affecting America such as race, science, sports, sex & dating, old people, immigration (No way Jose!), etc. All of the chapters begin with text in the shape of an American flag and this book includes my favorite book feature, say it with me, foot notes. It also includes margin notes that read much like The Colbert Report's famous segment The Word. I'll break it down for you now: this book is funny. Colbert is pretty great and even now, watching the video of the White House Correspondents Dinner, I want to make excited arm-pump gestures like Dwight Schrute. I hope he doesn't actually run for president because I think that's taking it too far, but otherwise, he's great and the book is an extension of his greatness. Just like he planned. I should stop gushing now, instead, I'll share some funny excerpts from the book.

Page 108: Things That Are Trying To Turn Me Gay and Their Success On A Scale Of One To Ten. Gay People get a 4 while Clive Owen gets an 8.

The chapter on seniors starts out in large print. Stephen then goes on to say on page 22 "Plus: Since seniors can't read this I can say whatever I want about them. They look like lizards. See? No angry letters.."

In the Media chapter, Stephen mentions on page 152, "Simple Question with a 'Yes' answer: Is the mainstream press too liberal? The answer is Yes. Need proof? Just look at some of the headlines I'm able to imagine." Included is the High Times headline "That's Right. This Magazine Exists!"

TV Show: How I Met Your Mother

2007-10-23T13:31:00.000-05:00

Ok people, I'm busy. I'm in a wedding this weekend and I've got lots of papers to write this week for school. I don't have time to review a book so you're getting a quick TV show review (and you're gonna like it). I got into the CBS half-hour sitcom How I Met Your Mother last year and was able to catch up on past episodes. The third season just began Monday nights on CBS. It's good, it's witty and funny and Neil Patrick Harris is awesome. He's great as the ladies man and class clown Barney, plus NPH has had some excellent roles on Broadway, not to mention the best cameo in a movie ever. I love the relationship between Lily and Marshall, college sweethearts who tied the knot at the end of last season. Jason Segel and Alyson Hannigan have great chemistry and make the couple seem very real and lots of fun. So yeah, you should all watch the show, you'd like it. I'll be back next week with a book review once the craziness subsides. Take it easy...and suit up!

Twilight

2007-10-15T19:46:00.000-05:00

A coworker of mine is a big fan of the Stephenie Meyer Twilight series and after I waited on hold for a long time for the first book, simply titled Twilight, it finally came in last week. I had heard a lot of good things about this book and lately I've been hearing this series hyped as the new Harry Potter. Now I wouldn't go that far, but this book was good. Really good. It's a big book but didn't feel that way at all. I sped through this story about Bella, a higher schooler transplanted to the small town of Forks in the Pacific Northwest to live with her dad after her mom in Phoenix decides to follow her basketball playing boyfriend across the U.S. Bella soon meets her classmate, the mysterious Edward Cullen and is intrigued by his anger towards her and his manner in general. Their journey through desire and love is a unique one since Edward is a vampire and technically wants to eat Bella, although he is also very much in love with her. This book was very well written and the descriptions of vampiric culture and all that goes along with it were interesting and definitely plausible within the context of the story. Meyer's website is full of great information regarding the whole series and I'm now anxiously awaiting books 2 and 3 New Moon and Eclipse so I can read more about Edward and Bella.

I'm A Lebowski, You're A Lebowski

2007-10-08T11:15:00.000-05:00

If you've never seen The Big Lebowski, something is terribly wrong. I remember when I first saw it during my first year of college thinking, this is weird...yet, AWESOME. You owe yourself at least a few viewings to properly appreciate it. Nobody knows this better than the organizers of Lewbowski Fest and authors of the book I'm A Lebowski, You're A Lebowski: Life, The Big Lebowski and What Have You. Written by Bill Green, Ben Peskoe, Will Russell and Scott Shuffitt with a foreword by The Dude himself, Jeff Bridges, this book has everything you ever wanted to know and more about the Cohen brothers cult classic film. Although I'm not really cool enough to be an "achiever" (the term Lebowski enthusiasts reserve for themselves), this book was more than enjoyable. There are so many excellent features, interviews with the cast, quizzes, pictures and possible religions represented by the film. One of my favorite features was the best lines from the Comedy Central version of the film. Since the characters utter almost 300 f-bombs, the book presents a list of the best-of dubbed lines from the TV version on page 35. Also enjoyable are the interviews with the real people on which the characters are based. Also, a bonus, this book has footnotes in the introduction. Sweet. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to make myself a white Russian.

Author: John Green

2007-10-01T20:57:00.000-05:00

Perhaps you've discovered Brotherhood 2.0 already, but if you haven't...it's amazing. Brothers John and Hank Green are spending 2007 communicating without text (email, text messages, letters, etc) and have recorded a video blog entry for every day of this year. Most loyal Brotherhood 2.0 viewers are nerdfighters, described as nerds who fight for the rights of nerd everywhere; John and Hank say they're made of awesome. And it's true. A friend and I were discussing today what we're going to do when the year is over and they stop making videos every day. Our conclusion: surely die. If you can only watch one, I'd suggest August 30th which is a rare occasion of John and Hank appearing together in a video. It also contains one of my favorite lines ever:

John: The nerdfighter happy dance videos are so crazy, sexy and cool, they could be a TLC album!
Hank: Word.

That was a very long introduction to the fact that John is, in addition to being a nerdfighter, an author of young adult books. His two books Looking For Alaska and An Abundance Of Katherines are both wonderful, well-written and funny. Looking For Alaska is about sixteen-year-old Miles and his experience at a boarding school. Miles tries to explore a relationship that is more than friends with Alaska, the mysterious feminist who enjoys Miles obsession with famous last words. Readers are led to believe that a momentous event is on its way as chapters are titled 30 Days Before and such. When tragedy strikes Miles and his prankster friends, they must figure out how to deal with what has happened. This book was very clever and witty while still managing to deal with intense subject matter appropriately. I loved it.

An Abundance of Katherines deals with genius and recent high school graduate Colin who is trying to devise a mathematical equation to explain why he's dated and been dumped by 19 girls named Katherine. When the book begins, Colin has just been dumped by Katherine the Nineteenth and is very sad. His best friend Hassan decides that the two are going to take a road trip and they end up in Gunshot, Tennessee of all places. They end up staying and getting jobs with Lindsey, a local whose friends make the summer interesting for Hassan and Colin. This book has my new favorite fun book special feature: footnotes. I've determined that only the coolest fiction/memoir-ish books have footnotes. This book, Paul Feig's Superstud and Chuck Klosterman's Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs all have footnotes thereby proving my point.

So yeah, John Green and his brother Hank are both pretty jokes. You should all check out Brotherhood 2.0. NERDFIGHTERS!

Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs

2007-09-24T23:13:00.001-05:00

Chuck Klosterman established himself as a popular culture powerhouse with Fargo Rock City, Killing Yourself To Live and Chuck Klosterman IV. His collection of essays titled Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs deconstructs popular culture and the world we live in by explaining his various theories that relate to movies, music, sports, relationships, celebrities, and of course, sex, drugs and cereal. His essay about how The Real World has turned itself into a parody of itself is brilliant and so eloquently describes why I stopped watching regularly after Las Vegas (the let's-get-drunk-and-have-sex-on-the-first-night cast). That's not to say that I stopped all together though; let's face it, I had to see fellow Wisconsinite Landon once in a while in Philly. Another of my favorite essays documented Klosterman's hatred of soccer and explained why it appeals mostly to young kids. Hatred of soccer is certianly a sentiment with which I completely agree. When I studied abroad in France, my host sister came home from school one day and mentioned how her friend asked what she was doing that night. My host sister replied, "Well, if there's a soccer game on, my dad will watch it while the three girls sit around and read." Her friend said, "That's how it works at my house too." Although that's perhaps more a comment on gender roles, it also speaks volumes about how boring and lame soccer is. All the essays are awesome and make the reader more aware of popular culture and how it impacts their every day life as well as their relationships. Klosterman spends the first essay blaming John Cusack for Kosterman's failure to truly fall in love. My favorite quote from the book appears in the essay about the Left Behind book series in which the day of reckoning arrives and all the good people disappear to heaven, except Kirk Cameron who is apparently left behind to star in Left Behind: The Movie That's Supposed to Revive My Career...Or Not.

From page 230: "...Post-Rapture earth initially seems like a better place to live. Everybody boring would be gone. One could assume that all the infidels who weren't teleported into God's kingdom must be pretty cool: All the guys would be drinkers and all the women would be easy, and you could make jokes about homeless people and teen suicide and crack babies without offending anyone. Quite frankly, my response to the opening pages of Left Behind was 'Sounds good to me.'"

How can you not love a book with a quote like that?

I Love You Phillip Morris

2007-09-17T21:26:00.000-05:00

A while ago I read that Jim Carey had signed on to a do a movie adaption of the non-fiction book I Love You Phillip Morris: A True Story of Life, Love and Prison Breaks by Steve McVicker so I decided to check out the book. Houston Chronicle reporter McVicker became very interested in the story of Steven Russel, a married man and father of one who fell in love with his cell mate, the aforementioned Phillip Morris. Russel had always known he was gay and when he and Morris were thrown together in prison in Houston they hit it off immediately. When they started a relationship everything was great because they were together all the time; the trouble started when Morris was released and Russel was still serving his sentence. McVicker's book chronicles Russel's spectacular prison breaks, each one on a Friday the 13th. Russel is an amazingly talented con man and manages to do everything he can to be with Morris, from stealing a walkie-talkie and coloring his clothes in the toilet to applying for six-figure CEO and CFO jobs while still in prison to faking his own death from AIDS. As spectacular as all of Russel's adventures were, this book was nothing short of dull. It had a lot of facts and although the subject matter was interesting, the book itself fell short. Maybe Jim Carey can breathe new life into this story when it comes to the big screen and treat us to the crazy madcap adventure that this story deserves.

More about the MPAA

2007-09-11T23:27:00.000-05:00

A while ago I broke convention and reviewed a movie. The movie I reviewed, This Film Not Yet Rated, is a documentary about the MPAA ratings system. You can read that review here. Today on a blog, I saw a link to the funniest reasons the MPAA used for rating some well known movies and thought they might be of interest to my readers (all 12 of you). They're pretty amusing, read about them here.

Chick Lit Duo

2007-09-10T20:25:00.000-05:00

This past week I read two more chick lit-y type books and although the last book I reviewed was chick lit, don't go thinking I've gone soft on y'all. I'm reading a classic pop culture book right now that I'll review next week but trust me, the two books presented today are good ones.

Last summer I reviewed Diana Peterfreund's first novel in a series about elite college Eli's secret society Rose and Grave titled Secret Society Girl. I enjoyed the first book a lot, it was a fun and quick read. The second book in the series, Under the Rose: An Ivy League Novel came out recently and picks up where the last story left off. The main character Amy Haskel is a member of the secret society Rose and Grave and in the second book the society is having some trouble keeping their time-honored secrets. A member has been leaking secrets to the public and a mystery surrounding the secrets makes things interesting. In addition to Amy dating a fellow society member, she has to deal with roommate issues and the disappearance of another female society member. Overall, this book was fun and the added mystery made it enjoyable. Check out Diana's website here.

A friend recommended a YA novel to me last week called Dramarama by E. Lockhart. If you're a faithful reader you know of my interest in theatre and Broadway musicals and this book was perfect for me. High school friends Sadye and Demi are accepted to Wildewood for a summer theatre program. They document their journey in a microcassette recorder and the transcripts are part of the novel following their camp time through Cats, Bye Bye Birdie, A Midsummer Nights Dream and Guys and Dolls. The two make many friends, boyfriends and, as indicated by the title, deal with drama both on stage and off. In addition to a great soundtrack, this book is great fun and appeals to adults (or at least this adult) as well as the YA audience for which it was written. Check out Lockhart's website here.

Swapping Lives

2007-09-04T22:35:00.001-05:00

Last week I had started a bunch of different books and nothing was grabbing my attention. I finally started a book I knew I'd like because sometimes chick lit is just what the doctor ordered. Swapping Lives by Jane Green is sort of like a book version of Wife Swap or Trading Spouses. The two women in this book, British Vicky Townsley and American Amber Winslow are both dissatisfied with their lives and are ready for a change. Vicky is a single woman in her thirties who lives with her cat, works as a magazine features editor and is juggling famous funny man playboy Jaime and her "neighborhood shag" Daniel. Amber is a desperate housewife from Connecticut who has a full-time nanny for her three kids and spends all her time with "the League" doing charity work. The thing is - although the League raises money for the needy they're all about wearing Prada and Gucci and carrying Birkin bags. This is causing Amber a serious case of keeping-up-with-the-Joneses. When the magazine that Vicky works for offers the two women a chance to swap lives, they do it and figure out that they need to make some changes in their own lives. Although this is a predictable story that's been told before, Green puts enough funny and cute into it to make it a good summer read.

Freak Show

2007-08-26T21:27:00.001-05:00

James St. James attained infamous celebrity status as a club kid in the late 80s and early 90s. He wrote a book about those years titled Disco Bloodbath: A Fabulous But True Tale of Murder In Clubland which was later made into the movie Party Monster starring Seth Green as James St. James. After all of this success, James, who spends much time writing for various websites and commenting on pop culture shows decided to write his first novel. Freak Show is the story of Billy, who describes himself on the first page as "relentlessly fabulous" and his move to an ultra-conservative new private high school. As a kid who is totally different from all of his classmates, he is mercilessly teased and assaulted until a brutal beating sends him to the hospital. During his time there he is befriended by Flip Kelly, the sexy BMOC football star. When Billy decides to run for homecoming queen, things really get interesting. This novel is for young adults, but has themes that are universal to anybody who's ever gone to high school. Once I got used to Billy writing in all caps with an unnecessary amount of exclamation points per page (I am very anti-exclamation point; I used to scratch them out of my college textbooks...but I digress) I enjoyed it. Based on St. James' own experience, this book gives a most unique voice to the traditional odd-man-out adolescent story. For an interesting interview with St. James about the book: check this out.

The Book Of Spam

2007-08-13T22:28:00.000-05:00

www.thebookofspam.com
www.myspace.com/thebookofspam
www.30daysofspam.com

Have you ever wondered how SPAM (no, not the email kind) got to be such a well-loved and ubiquitous part of our culture? Well...Dan Armstrong and Dustin Black have worked very hard to bring us The Book of Spam to help answer all of your SPAM related questions and enlighten readers with lots of interesting facts about spiced ham. Billed as "a most glorious and definitive compendium of the World's Favorite Canned Meat", this reference has everything you'd ever want related to SPAM and the information is presented with wit and humor. This book has the history of the SPAM can; an "obligatory time line"; information about the SPAM Museum in Austin, MN; and tons of vintage SPAM ads ("SPAM bake would tickle all of us!"). All of the SPAM history is very interesting; there is a two-page spread devoted to the changing labels, a section on SPAM in WWII and a whole chapter devoted to the SPAMMOBILE including my favorite part - the SPAMMOBILE vs. the Popemobile. This feature is hilarious just like the rest of the book and shows that SPAM is the real winner here, it's even in the title of a hit musical. Armstrong and Black have made spiced ham enough fun with their new book, even this vegetarian has grown to love it.

ETA - I don't know what's wrong with me but I got Dustin's name wrong in an email (Justin...wrong) and Dan's name wrong on my first try at this review (Dean...wrong). I'm sorry.

Summer at Tiffany

2007-08-05T11:30:00.000-05:00

I came across a cute little book a while ago titled Summer At Tiffany by Marjorie Hart. Ms. Hart spent one summer during college working at Tiffany and Company on 5th Avenue in New York City during World War II and her adventures are chronicled in this book. The author details the summer of 1945 when her and her friend Marty leave the University of Iowa to come to the big city. At first they are sure they'll be able to get jobs at a clothing store, but when that doesn't pan out they use Marty's connections to get jobs with Tiffany. While this impresses their friends and they get to wear cute sky blue dresses, they are making only $20 a week and have to pinch their pennies all summer and budget for everything - even 15 cent lunches. The tales of famous people like Judy Garland and Vincent Minnelli (!) who visit the store are interesting and Hart's account of the war through the eyes of a small town girl whose cousins are in combat is sad. This book was very cute and for a slight cynic like me, at times it was too cute. The girls use terms like, "Good Night!" that mean "No Way!" and get upset when their hair is messed up in the rain or their stocking stick (used instead of nylons to conserve during the war - weird) gets on their dresses. Overall though, this book was worth it for a nice story about an unforgettable summer.

How To Talk To A Widower

2007-07-25T11:41:00.000-05:00

So I spent all day last Saturday reading Harry Potter. I loved it and thought that J.K. Rowling did a wonderful job. That's why when I see articles like Who Dies In Harry Potter? God I get very angry. "Harry Potter lives in a world free of any religion or spirituality of any kind." That must be nice for Harry, but see I live in America where we supposedly have separation of church and state. And lest we forget, we're talking about a freaking childrens novel...is the author of this article suggesting we indoctrinate them young? Whew, okay, let's move on before that article gets any more of a rise out of me.

As if I weren't lucky enough this weekend, in addition to reading Harry Potter, I got to start a new book that I've been looking forward to for a long time. Jonathan Tropper's latest novel, How To Talk To A Widower was released last week. This book tells the story of Doug Parker, a man in his early thirties who lost his wife Hailey the year before to an airplane crash. Since this is a Tropper novel, the cast of supporting characters are wonderfully quirky and certainly don't make Doug's life easy. His take-charge pregnant twin sister Claire has just moved in with Doug and Hailey's trouble-making son Russ. Russ is in love with Doug's other sister Debbie, who is marrying Doug's friend Mike. This pair hooked up for the first time during shiva for Hailey and Doug still carries that resentment and wants pretty much nothing to do with the wedding. Add to this a housewife who Doug starts sleeping with, Russ's guidance counselor whose feelings for Doug are more than friendly, and Doug's very dramatic former stage actress mother who round out a novel chock full of wonderful characters. Of course these people bring the funny, but there are plenty of touching moments as Doug journeys through his grief and writes his column with the same title as the book. Although supremely witty like his other books, the pain that the main character is experiencing also comes through and makes this book very real.

I especially loved the relationship between Doug and Russ and their repartee makes the book that much more fun. From page 287:
"Russ. Can we be serious for a moment?"
"Doug, if we can't be serious for a moment, then the terrorists have already won."

Pottermania

2007-07-16T22:41:00.000-05:00

I'm going a little bit crazy in anticipation of the new Harry Potter book. I saw the Order of the Phoenix movie last Wednesday and although I liked it, I didn't love it. So now I'm feverishly reading book 6 so as to be fully caught up when book 7 drops into my hands at 12:01 on Saturday. I'm one of those people who sees the movie the day it comes out and gets the book as soon as I can...and I gotta say, I love it.

In addition to re-reading HP6, I've been obsessively watching Rescue Me. This show was recommended to me by a coworker and I sped through season one on DVD only to be now caught up with season two. The drama plus the hot firefighting men make this show totally worth watching. So I really haven't been reading books that I can review on here. I read a few in the past couple of weeks but none of them moved me enough to write either a positive or negative review.

Soon the Harry Potter madness will be over, I'll be able to read one of the great books waiting for me on my shelf (like Love is a Mix Tape or The Witch of Portobello). Stay tuned dear readers.

This Film Is Not Yet Rated

2007-07-10T10:02:00.000-05:00

Today happens to be my birthday and since it's common knowledge that one gets to do whatever one wants on one's birthday (like use the overly pretentious term "one"), I'm going to review a movie.

The other night Fimoculous.com mentioned that the entirety of This Film Is Not Yet Rated directed by Kirby Dick was up on Google Video. I've been wanting to see this documentary about the MPAA ratings system for a while and this seemed to be the perfect opportunity. Dick covers many issues regarding movie ratings throughout the film. He interviews famous directors whose films were at first given an NC-17 rating such as John Waters (A Dirty Shame), Kimberly Peirce (Boys Don't Cry), Wayne Kramer (The Cooler), Mary Harron (American Psycho), Kevin Smith (Jersey Girl) and Jaime Babbit (But I'm A Cheerleader). In addition to discussing why their movies didn't get R ratings like movies with similar scenes, most of these directors feel that their films were denied for include gay themes or "overtly displayed" female pleasure. During one montage, Kirby Dick shows very similar straight love scenes from R rated movies and gay love scenes from NC-17 rated movies. In addition to pointing out that there are no rules for the ratings board to follow or precedents that directors can quote in an appeal process, Dick tries to unmask the members of the rating board who are kept secret by the MPAA with the help of Becky, a private investigator. The members are supposed to serve for 3 years and have children between the ages of five and 17. Without spoiling the surprise, let's just say that the actual members fit a very different profile. Finally, Dick goes through the appeals process that directors may go through when their films receive an NC-17 rating and uncovers the members of the appeals board including two members of the clergy (Catholic and Episcopalian - never different religions) which is unbelievable to me. Overall this movie, like any good documentary, made me angry about the status quo and appreciative that someone tried to blow the cover off of this system that one director accurately described as fascist.

Girls Who Like Boys Who Like Boys

2007-07-02T21:28:00.000-05:00

So I got this book on hold at work and when I went to grab it from my basket, it had this note on it from one of my coworkers. I liked it and thought it was funny so I left it on and thought I'd share it with y'all.

Melissa De La Cruz and Tom Dolby edited the collection of essays with a foreword by Armistead Maupin titled Girls Who Like Boys Who Like Boys: True Tales of Love, Lust and Friendship Between Straight Women and Gay Men which features a host of stories by lots of popular authors. Maupin's foreword is a perfect start to the collection, he's so great. The first section is "Gays and Gals" and most of the essays in that section did not grab me because they were about more stereotypical Will and Grace type activities like shopping and clubbing. The next sections proved to be much better and have more heartfelt stories describing touching friendships between real people rather than what seemed like caricatures. The last section about family, "Fathers and Daughters, Mothers and Sons" was very well written and interesting. Most of the essays in this book showed true-to-life friendships and relationships between straight women and gay men and overall I was pleased with the book and the image of friendship it portrayed.

I Hate Other People's Kids

2007-06-25T22:37:00.000-05:00

For a while now, I've watched Adrianne Frost comment on VH1's Best Week Ever and every time I see Author, I Hate Other People's Kids under her name all I can think is, "That must be a really hilarious book." And in fact, it is. Frost is totally unapologetic about the fact that not only does she not want kids, she doesn't like kids. She handily provides the reader with a beginning section dedicated to different types of evil children (identifying the enemy) followed by places you may encounter other people's kids (OPK) and finally the most important section on how to deal with both parents and kids. The one liners in this book are wonderful, any page you open will make you laugh out loud with truisms such as, "You don't need to see the birthing tape. You don't want to see the birthing tape," page 114. There are also quizzes throughout the book as well as little boxes of text like "parents think it's cute but it isn't" or "for your consideration: ugly babies". Call me cruel, but this book spoke to my not-ready-to-even-think-about-marriage-let-alone-loud-annoying-children soul. Plus, it's really funny.

Michael Tolliver Lives

2007-06-20T22:30:00.000-05:00

Back in March, I was already thinking about summer reading and mentioned Michael Tolliver Lives by Armistead Maupin as a book that I was really excited to read. Well, it finally came out and I got it a few days ago. To be honest, I could exhaust the "good" entry in any thesaurus documenting my love for this book. It was great and not only did it live up to my expectations, it surpassed them. Although it is not supposed to be another Tales of the City book, it pretty much is and I'm totally okay with that. Most of the characters from 28 Barbary Lane make an appearance or are at least mentioned as main character Michael Tolliver and his younger husband Ben attempt to deal with Michael's homophobic family and the declining health of both Tolliver's mother and former landlady and friend Anna Madrigal. Secrets are revealed about family and friends during the book and there are some real characters made out of Michael's sister-in-law with her religious puppet shows and Michael's mother's hairdresser Patreese. As always with Maupin, it's the humor and pop culture references that make the story so great. If you liked the Tales of the City books or mini-series (there were three of them - does that make it mini-serieses?), you owe it to yourself to read this book.

I Am Not Myself These Days

2007-06-17T13:29:00.001-05:00

Josh Kilmer-Purcell grew up in Wisconsin but after he moved to New York City, his life was anything but ordinary. His memoir I Am Not Myself These Days is about his first year in NYC, his career as a drag queen and his relationship with his crack-addicted prostitute boyfriend. Reading this book was sort of like watching a reality TV show or a train wreck in that I couldn't stop or look away.

A typical night for Kilmer-Purcell as described in the book consists of spending hours getting into his drag queen "Aquadisiac" costume, drinking more vodka than he can remember, performing at a night club in his costume which features fish bowls with live goldfish in them for breasts, coming home to sleep for a few hours if he's lucky, and then getting up to go and work at an advertising agency. When Aqua meets Jack, a male escort who lives in a luxury penthouse apartment, they fall in love and Josh moves to the penthouse. Their relationship becomes complicated fast as Jack's drug problems spiral out of control and Josh's drinking (in order to shave 7 inches or more off his waist to fit into his costumes) follows. The tumultuous year is almost unbelievable with the crazy New York nightlife and the ins and outs of the relationship between these two men. One of my favorite parts is when Josh's mother visits. Josh and Jack must concoct a plausible story for Jack's job that would involve him being paged at all hours and they come up travel agent to the very rich. When Josh's coworker Laura has lunch with Josh and his mother, mom asks, "So Laura, have you ever used Jack's services?" The author describes this moment as the kind he lives for and rightfully so. Overall, I enjoyed this book although I found myself exhausted just reading about this lifestyle. I can't imagine what living it must have been like.

Porn for Women

2007-06-11T21:19:00.001-05:00

I wanted to up the number of visitors to my blog and I thought...hmm...how can I do that? I know - PORN!

Okay, no, not really. There has been a lot of blog buzz recently about a new book by the Cambridge Women's Pornography Cooperative with photos by Susan Anderson titled Porn For Women. I've had this on my list for the blog for a while but today's article in the Huffington Post goes quite in depth and I thought today should be the day I shared it with my readers. Here's the deal: this book doesn't show what you immediately think of when you think about porn. Not that you think about porn...oh God, now my mom is going to stop reading this and my readership will be decimated. Sorry, Mom.

The pictures in this book are of men doing housework with little thought bubbles saying things like "God, that's SO interesting, tell me more." The tagline says that this book features truly sensitive guys who will fulfill your real fantasies. The Cambridge Women's Pornography Cooperative is serious about this book which is not apparent when you look at the cover featuring a guy vacuuming in a douche bag-y button down striped shirt and tight jeans. The CWPC thinks that the way women look at pornography should be redefined and this is the style of book with which they plan to reclaim porn for "the rest of us". I agree with the Feministing and Huffington Post bloggers that this book is insulting to women. It's sort of funny to try and turn a stereotype on its head but this book is pigeonholing women; showing us as housewives who just want a hunky guy to do our house cleaning is as bad as thinking that all women want that life. Heather Peterson is the only member of the cooperative who will identify herself and she says that when the book makes the rounds at parties, it generally elicits howls of laughter from the women while men are sitting "with their mouths agape. Is the key to women's sexuality so simple? Yes!" [Source] Seriously? If that's true, I'm never going to a party again. No wonder the members of the CWPC prefer to keep their identities secret, who would want to be tied to this book?

Dreamgirls

2007-06-10T23:10:00.000-05:00

So I wanted a chance to talk about lots of stuff tonight, but since this is technically a book review blog, I'll also touch on the Dreamgirls movie companion book. First off, there's a really interesting NYT article about how authors are using technology to write their novels. You can read it here.

If you read this blog regularly you know how much I love Broadway musicals. Well, I had a wonderful day today because not only were the Tony Awards tonight, but I also found out that the documentary film ShowBusiness: The Road to Broadway is coming to Madison. The Tonys were very enjoyable as was the obsessive fan streaming video on the Tony Awards website of the red carpet arrivals. I must say that I was very disappointed that Raul Esparza did not win for Best Actor in a Musical for his role as Bobby in the revival of Company. He gave an earth shattering performance at the awards that I hope lands on YouTube very soon because I can't wait to see it again. Spring Awakening cleaned up tonight and took Best Musical which I figured it would and wanted it to. It was funny how they changed the lyrics to the Spring Awakening songs...we certainly wouldn't want to talk about sex on CBS.

Following the musical theatre theme (despite my many promises to shut up about musicals already), I finally saw the movie Dreamgirls last night. Although I loved the music and the costumes were amazing, I think this show made the mistake so many weird-feeling movie musicals make - they didn't start out with a musical number. By not immediately suspending reality, the musical numbers that didn't occurred on a stage during the movie felt strange. Other than that, I was happy with the result and thought Jennifer Hudson blew Beyonce out of the water. Alright, book review time. Dreamgirls: The Movie Musical by Bill Condon (the movie's director) is a big colorful book featuring tons of pictures of movie scenes and the actors. It also has testimony from people involved with the movie and information on the sets and costumes. It's fun to flip through if you like the movie. So there you have it, a really long Tony Award review and a really short book review. Sorry.

Backstage with Beth and Trina

2007-06-04T13:02:00.001-05:00

Remember scratch and sniff stickers? There were chocolate ones, peanut butter ones, fruit ones. Nobody ever understood how exactly the smells were contained in an itty bitty sticker that even after it had been on your folder forever, still smelled a bit like strawberries (like every crazy thing associated with Strawberry Shortcake, even DVD cases...how do they do that?!).

Well, just because we're adults now doesn't mean we can't still enjoy the beauty of scratch and sniff. Enter the rockin'-est scratch and sniff book for adults, Backstage with Beth and Trina by Julie Blattberg. This little pink book takes readers on an adventure with partiers during a typical Friday night at the club. The beauty of this book is that instead of simply reading about Trina and Beth getting ready, going to the concert at the club, making new friends to get them back stage, trying to hook up with the band and discussing the whole experience at a diner in the morning, the reader can smell their way through while admiring Wendi Koontz's illustrations. Smells you never imagined would be created with scratch and sniff technology entice (or repulse) the reader: lip gloss, car freshner, cigarettes, stale beer and vomit, naturally followed by gum and coffee all aid the illustrations and text. Like the most bad-ass picture book ever, Backstage with Beth and Trina is popular culture at it's best. My favorite page: "This is such a fun party! Everyone is SO friendly" accompanies a scratch and sniff icon directly over the bong. Although I have never been able to procure backstage passes and meet the band, this book just made that experience a little bit more of a reality in a totally fun way.

Actions Speak Louder Than Bumper Stickers

2007-05-31T00:06:00.000-05:00

When I got the book Actions Speak Louder Than Bumper Stickers by Olivia Greer and Aaron Rudenstine I sort of expected a collection of funny bumper stickers in the vein of "Sex On TV Can't Hurt You Unless You Fall Off". Who in their right mind would put that on their car by the way? Anywho, instead of being a collection of amusing bumper stickers, this book presents a host of politically relevant bumper stickers with information about where to buy them and little factoids about the Bush administration that pertain to the bumper sticker. The problem with this book is that it's adding fuel to the fire. By showing me horrible statistics like how many years it's been since Bush declared "Mission Accomplished!" in Iraq wearing that ridiculous flight suit side by side with "A Village in Texas is Missing Their Idiot" style bumper sticker is just rubbing salt in the wound at this point. Although I appreciate this book for what it's trying to do and commend the authors' thorough citations, it just makes me sad about the state of our government and our country. There are so many depressing facts in this book about how government money has been spent since 2000 that it more than overshadows the wisdom these bumper stickers offer. But maybe I can't relate...after all, I've never had a bumper sticker on my car, it's like my fear of tattoos - too permanent.

Wordplay

2007-05-22T21:17:00.000-05:00

Perhaps you've seen the spectacular documentary Spellbound. If not, you should. It's an awesome and hilarious movie about the National Spelling Bee that follows some of the young contestants who eventually make it to the top ten. If my winning recommendation doesn't convince you, Nerve.com just put it at number 40 on their list of 50 Best Date Movies. If documentaries are your thing you should also see Wordplay and read the official companion book by the creators of the movie featuring a foreword by Will Shortz. Wordplay, like Spellbound, is about a rag-tag bunch of people who are really good at something kinda nerdy and compete in it. Although instead of spelling, this time it's crossword puzzles. Featuring the contestants who eventually round out the top of the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament, Wordplay also features interviews by Bill Clinton, Jon Stewart, The Indigo Girls, Bob Dole and other smartie pants celebrities who do the New York Times crossword puzzle. Will Shortz, the editor of the New York Times crossword is also the head of the tournament where the documentary comes to a dramatic finale. The companion book features a lot of the same people who appear in the documentary including Merl Reagle who teaches us how to construct a crossword. There's a part about Sundance because Wordplay killed in Park City last year and the book also has little spotlights on the contestants featured in the film. Plus, there's 50 crosswords in the book including all the ones done by people during the documentary. So c'mon now, it's summer and you have time to watch a bunch of nerds compete in a battle of wits...trust me, it's funny and heartwarming.

Superstud

2007-05-14T00:12:00.000-05:00

A while back I reviewed Mortified and when Nonanon reviewed it she suggested Paul Feig's Superstud: Or How I Became a 24-Year-Old Virgin as a better use of the high school journal as book comedy format. That Nonanon: right every time. First of all, Paul Feig can pretty much do no wrong in my book. Although this is embarrassing to admit, he was excellent as Sabrina the Teenage Witch's science teacher Mr. Pool who Sabrina magicked to be an alchemist (not that I was watching that episode the other day on ABC Family...or anything). More importantly, and way less embarrassing, he created Freaks and Geeks (best TV show ever) and directed seven episodes of Arrested Development. So clearly, he's amazing.

Superstud was hilariously heartbreaking describing Feig trying to navigate the extremely complicated dating world. Freaks and Geeks fans will recognize certain elements of the show in Feig's life but really, this book appeals to everyone. Feig writes his life so funny with absolutely no shame and provides a refreshing feel for a seriously geeky guy who just wants to get laid. The author's diaries make an appearance about halfway through the book where he footnotes them. Incidentally, I'm reading An Abundance of Katherines right now and these two books are turning me into a big footnote fan. My favorite part of the diary footnoting comes on page 172. Diary: "I kissed her goodnight about three times (lost control for a moment!)" Footnote: "Yes, what a wild man I was."

I can't say anything bad about this book, it's well-written, funny and sweet. Like Feig's television work, it's all good. Now I'm eagerly awaiting reading his other book, Kick Me: Adventures in Adolescence.

Totally Awesome 80s

2007-05-02T21:49:00.000-05:00

Before I begin, a quick piece of news. The New York Times published an article today about the lack of book reviews in newspapers due to the booming book blog business (say that five times fast). You can read it here.

Recently, I reviewed Matthew Rettenmund's novel Blind Items and after that had a chance to read Boy Culture as well. Since I was on a little Rettenmund kick, I thought it'd be appropriate to check out Totally Awesome 80s: A Lexicon of the Music, Videos, Movies, TV Shows, Stars, and Trends of that Decadent Decade. This is designed as a reference book with lists like "Twenty Names That Have Not Been Said Aloud Since the 80s" (page 19). Included in that list is Clara Peller of "Where's the Beef?" fame. Also present is a comprehensive guide to 80s speak as well as lots of information about music, movies and TV shows. Unfortunately, all of the pictures are in black and white which seemed fairly antithetical to the 80s, but the cover almost made up for that. Overall, I liked this book due to Rettenmund's humor with the subjects he covers. The thing about this book that it put it over the edge into excellent (totally awesome, if you will) was the fact that in the list of underrated 80s movies on page 115 it lists Clue and then on the same page mentions the scene in A Room With A View where the boys run around the pond in twenty movie moments of the 80s you'll never forget. So true Matthew, those are two great movies I won't soon forget. In the mass of decade books this one stands out for it's devotion to the true pop culture of the time.

One more thing while we're discussing the 80s. Today and tomorrow various theatres are showing Dirty Dancing on the big screen again for its 20th anniversary which is pretty sweet. I carried a watermelon.

Why You're Still Single

2007-04-26T23:28:00.000-05:00

Obviously I read a lot of books. This being the case, I have a few Internet services offering their "expert" ideas of what other books I might like. When Why You're Still Single: Things Your Friends Would Tell You If You Promised Not To Get Mad by Evan Marc Katz and Linda Holmes showed up on my Amazon recommendations a while ago, I laughed it off. Unfortunately, things took a turn for the worse today when LibraryThing also decided that I would be interested in this book. With two sites recommending it, I started to get a bit offended. What exactly are they trying to say? Maybe when one looks at my library or book selections the term "loser" is the only appropriate label to apply to me? Or is it that my extreme interest in books about Broadway musicals must mean no man could put up with me? Supposedly Why You're Still Single lets you "laugh as you learn" but I'm not laughing.

Okay, to be honest, I'm laughing a little bit. Getting offended by a website generated recommendation is silly and I should probably man up and get over it. Now I'm not saying that I'm going to check out this book, but it could be worse...they could have recommended this.

La Dolce Musto

2007-04-18T23:47:00.000-05:00

Gossip bloggers today owe a lot to Michael Musto, he is truly a pioneer. Musto started in the 1980s writing his column La Dolce Musto for the Village Voice and recently published a collection of his columns as a book titled La Dolce Musto: Writings by the Worlds Most Outrageous Columnist. An out gay man, Musto pulls no punches about urging other celebrities to come out in his columns. He also details his day-to-day life in New York, his travels and the parties he attends starting with the Regan inaugural ball in 1985, detailed in the first column of the book. He is hilariously funny and self-deprecating, which never hurt someone who sometimes writes scathingly about others as a career. His columns are well written, witty and overall a treat to read. Also, the book is awesomely dedicated to "anyone who can still manage to exude glamour with mud dripping down his or her face," which can only mean good writings will follow.

Mortified

2007-04-06T13:27:00.000-05:00

Back in the day before blogs and the Internet, kids wrote their deepest darkest thoughts out longhand in cute little flowery notebooks with locks on them...not that I would know from personal experience...or...anything, ahem. Anywho, some of these kids saved their diaries and someone was thoughtful enough to compile them into a book. Based on his stage show, David Nadelberg's Mortified: Real Words. Real Kids. Real Pathetic. is just that. The chapters have portions of kids old diaries and sometimes include a comment at the end called "Adult Me Says:" which is usually the best part. For the most part this book is funny, but at times the author chooses to revisit the diaries in later chapters and it can be too much. If you're thinking it'd be fun to read your own diary again, I recommend just reading this book instead. It's much easier to laugh at the misery of others than cry at how pathetic you used to be.

The Call of the Weird

2007-03-28T22:56:00.000-05:00

At the beginning of the American edition of Louis Theroux's book The Call of the Weird: Travels in American Subcultures there is an introduction discussing outsiders observing the crazy things that Americans do. Theroux seems afraid of being compared to French historian Alexis de Tocqueville in detailing American culture, but that is not the case in this book modeled after the British television series Louis Theroux's Weird Weekends. The author proves himself worthy as he spends the book revisiting some of the characters he met throughout the show. From a man who claims to have met several aliens to former cult members to band leader Ike Turner to twin girls who sing White Power music, the ten different people or families in this book are certainly their own breed. Theroux paints the "main" characters well, despite only getting to speak with the acquaintances of a few because the people featured in the television series are missing in action. The author also includes funny asides like the 18-year-old British porn star wannabe who comments that America is so different because they have "loads of different fast-food places" (page 42). Theroux does a good job with this book because he seems to put himself in the situation and truly relate to the people he's interviewing, no matter their eccentricities. The author also provides sufficient background information on the subjects for us American readers who haven't seen the television show on which the book is based. Overall, an interesting read and a good reminder of why reality television is so popular in American - we're all a little bit nuts.

Julie & Julia

2007-03-18T22:21:00.000-05:00

It has been so long since my last post and I apologize. I had the flu and then the NCAA tournament started, needless to say that although I have excuses both good (sickness) and bad (basketball), I am back.

The book Julie & Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen by Julie Powell has been coming across the library desk for quite some time now and has the cutest cover. It's green with a whisk that has a little smiley egg on the handle end of it and whipped cream on the business end of it. That was enough to make me want to read the book even though I had heard some buzz about the book and the blog that came before it. The premise is simple: Julie, who is unhappy with her job and having trouble having children, decides that she's going to undergo a project and cook all recipes in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume One in one year. The book does use some of the blog entries directly but the author chronicles her government job and her cooking in addition to the intricacies of things like extracting bone marrow, boiling calves feet for gelatin and keeping brains in your bathroom sink. There were parts of the book I enjoyed, the recipes were very time consuming and the processes were interesting. This book could have been a lot better if the author had done a little less complaining and that was a problem. She rubbed me the wrong way in one of the first few chapters when she mentioned something about not treating service industry workers very well. She presents a lot of conversations where she's yelling at her husband who generally comes off as well meaning and helpful. This quote sort of sums up the way the author presents herself throughout the book.

"I, on the other hand, am not a good friend... I...have visited cities [Isabel] has been living in and not called. I couldn't tell you her birthday on a bet, and for Christmas I give her random doodads I pick up at the checkout counter at Barnes & Noble on Christmas Eve. I have never really gotten to know her boyfriends...," page 179.

I guess that my feeling was there was a lot of complaining (also about cost and time) regarding a project that the author chose to undertake and could have stopped at any time and not enough about how this cooking project was helping her life.

Blind Items

2007-03-06T22:22:00.000-06:00

Matthew Rettenmund's second novel, Blind Items: A (Love) Story is told from two different perspectives and gives the readers a glimpse into the lives of two men in New York City in the late 1990s. David Greer, who wants to be a real writer, is instead working for a gay porn magazine called Pumped, living in Chelsea and spending time with his best friends - Carol, who runs a kitschy knick knack shop and Warren, who writes a gossip column rivaling La Dolce Musto. One night when Warren can't attend a party, Carol and David go instead. While there David meets Alan Dillinger, a David Hasselhoff knockoff starring in the TV show Lifesavers. Alan is not out in his professional life though David quickly determines that Alan is out in his personal life and wants to date David. The novel follows the two men trying to keep their relationship afloat while hiding it from the paparazzi and Warren, the master of the gossip column blind item.

The book's format is done well and includes chapters of David in the present time juxtaposed with chapters of Alan as a teenager who is coming to terms with his sexuality and horrible home life. Rettenmund has a witty style of writing and puts in a lot of celebrity gossip - some of which is recognizable even years later. The issue of tabloids outing celebrities is still relevant today - Lance Bass's outing created the term "lanced" as in "Perez Hilton lanced Neil Patrick Harris". If you like this novel, check out Rettenmund's first novel Boy Culture which was recently made into a movie.

Summer Reading

2007-03-06T00:32:00.000-06:00

Winter sucks and since it's March, I figure now it's time to start thinking about summer. Why not dream big and just skip over spring for now? This summer is going to be bringing a few books I'm pretty excited about. Like big summer movies - yay for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix on July 13 :) - summer books are also big sellers (again with the Harry Potter).

The last Tales of the City book was published in 1989 and although I don't always get the San Fransisco in the 1970s pop culture references, I loved all the books. This summer will bring a favorite character back after all this time. Michael Tolliver Lives is set to be released June 1st and will tell the story of Michael at age 50.

My love for Jonathan Tropper has been well documented on this blog. This summer will see the release of How To Talk To A Widower on July 17. What I like most about Tropper's books is the humor and although this title doesn't sound like a laugh-a-minute, I'm sure it'll be great.

Anybody else looking forward to upcoming books? Feel free to share...

I Know You're Out There

2007-02-28T21:38:00.000-06:00

I don't normally review books that I found on other book blogs, I feel like it's book incest - it just seems wrong. Nonanon reviewed this last week (thanks!), which is where I got the idea. Fortunately for y'all, this book is just too damn funny not to share, so I'm breaking my own rule this week.

Michael Beaumier is the editor of the personals at the Chicago Reader and his book I Know You're Out There: Private Longings, Public Humiliations and Other Tales from the Personals presents stories related to his job and his life. This book is part memoir where Beaumier talks about his family and "the boyfriend" and part nonfiction where he discusses his job. His stories relating to ads and those placing them are so funny and told very well. There's a whole chapter devoted solely to his correspondence with a prison inmate seeking a "date" the night he is released; there's a chapter that details Beaumier's problems with a woman who is cheating on her husband, yet upset that her dates expect sex. Overall, I could not stop laughing at this one and had a hard time putting it down. It's a fun, quick read that paints a good picture of Beaumier's work and the good times he has with his coworkers Jeff and Andy. How can you not love a book that has a male to female/female to male personal ad translator - he says: sensitive, she hears: gay; she says: adventurous, he hears: slutty. It's good stuff.

Why Moms Are Weird

2007-02-21T22:28:00.000-06:00

A while back I reviewed Why Girls Are Weird by Pamela Ribon. Soon after I finished that book, I read her second book titled Why Moms Are Weird. I felt pretty much the same way about this book as I did about Ribon's first book. The plot of this novel revolves around Benny Bernstein who has to go home to Virginia after three years in Los Angeles. During the time she's been gone, Benny has lost 50 pounds and is just beginning a promising new love affair with Mickey who she met at the grocery store. Unfortunately, Benny's mom has just broken her leg in a car accident and lost her job and Benny's sister Jami can't take care of the mom even though the two live together. Benny ends up doing a complete overhaul of the house because she can't take all of her deceased father's things cluttering it up (or the excess of animals living there either). In the ensuing construction, Benny meets and flirts with the handyman Zach. It seems like they're going to hook up and he goes on and on about how he likes her - but then it turns out he's married. One of my coworkers commented that there is no way a man would expend all this emotion energy on someone who was not their wife, which I thought was a good point. Also weird in the guy department are Jami and the girls mother. Jami dates an abusive ex-con that she keeps going back to and the mother has three boyfriends who don't know about each other. Most of these situations are unbelievable and sort of silly. Overall the book was okay but nothing spectacular.

The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster

2007-02-14T22:08:00.000-06:00

So maybe you've seen cars or t-shirts with a logo that's similar to a Jesus fish but instead of a tail has spider-like limbs, googley eyes and the letters "FSM" in the middle of it. What's that all about, you probably asked yourself (like I did)? Well, it's the symbol for a new-ish religion: the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. The followers of this religion, who call themselves Pastafarians, abide by The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster by Bobby Henderson. The gospel is funny and the chapter entitled "What's the Matter with Evolution?" is used to introduce an alternative theory of Intelligent Design by postulating a theory about the chosen people: pirates. The chapter called "The Holy Noodle" discusses how the Flying Spaghetti Monster created the world and there is also a handy "History of Heretics" chapter if you want another reason to hate Leonardo Da Vinci (apparently he was a minor-league stickball prodigy). For the true disciples of Pastarianism, there are pamphlets and swag in the back of the book you can use to spread the word because after all, the motto of this religion is "try us for thirty days and if you don't like us, your God will most likely take you back." The footnotes may be the best part of this book, on page 19, "In 1929, Sir Alexander Fleming (no relation to Sir Elton John) first observed the bacterium staphylococci to experience inhibition on an agar plate contaminated by a penicillium (meaning 'many tiny penises') mold." Also worth checking out is the hate-mail on the website. RAmen!

Bitter With Baggage Seeks Same

2007-02-07T14:42:00.000-06:00

Sloane Tanen has a few books depicting "the lifes and times of some chickens" and her first is the quirky Bitter With Baggage Seeks Same. At first this looks like a children's book, so much so that on Tanen's website under the book covers they say "for adults". The book consists of a bunch of pictures of small toy chickens in settings with little descriptions under them. One of my favorites from this book is, "Samantha looked around the playground in amazement. Her mother had been right. She really was the smartest and the prettiest," accompanying a picture of a chicken alone on a swing with a bow in her hair. There are no page numbers in this book which is unusual. Overall, the book is pretty funny and gently pokes fun at modern women. My conclusion after reading the book was that the chicken dioramas would be best viewed in person as art work.

More Kasper Hauser

2007-02-06T21:18:00.000-06:00

A while ago, I reviewed SkyMaul by the comedy troupe Kasper Hauser. Today I found a link to their version of Craig's List and it's funny so I thought I'd share. You can find it here.

Sex Advice From...

2007-01-31T14:52:00.000-06:00

I'm sorry dear readers (hi mom), but my posting will most likely be limited to about once a week this semester as I have lots of class work to do. Boo.

Nerve magazine's mission statement states that they're "here because sex is beautiful and absurd, remarkably fun and reliably trauma-inducing. In short, it is a subject in need of a fearless, intelligent forum for both genders."

So in following with that mission statement, they publish a weekly column titled Sex Advice From.. with a different profession or hobby featured each week. This week it's subway performers, last week it was rowers, around Thanksgiving it was turkey farmers. The format is much like any other advice column, except that questions are repeated so the inquiring minds get advice from multiple firefighters (for what it's worth). Nerve recently published a bunch of these columns as a book titled Sex Advice From...: DJs, Sorority Girls, Cowboys, Car Dealers, Bartenders, Pool Cleaners, Hairstylists, and More! The book is by nerve.com and includes, in addition to the professions in the title: bloggers, lifeguards, record store workers and a bunch of other random people that the reader isn't sure actually know anything worthwhile about sex. The concept is catchy and the advice is often presented frankly, but the people giving the advice certainly aren't experts so it should probably be taken with a grain of salt. Then again, I checked out the book, so they must be doing something right.

You Suck

2007-01-23T15:01:00.000-06:00

You Suck: A Love Story is the sequel to Christopher Moore's first novel published in 1995, Blood Sucking Fiends: A Love Story. You Suck follows the story of Tommy, who has just been turned into a vampire by his girlfriend Jody because she was feeling lonely. Nineteen year old Tommy is found out to be a vampire by the band of buddies he used to work with at the local Safeway called the Animals who have just acquired a blue hooker from Vegas called (what else?) Blue. Blue's character is supposedly the "Cheddar Princess" from Fond du Lac, WI which adds that local connection I love so much to mention in my reviews. The Animals are trying to capture Tommy and Jody with the help of Blue and two San Fransisco cops. On Tommy and Jody's side is sixteen year old Abby Normal, their minion who Tommy seeks out after Jody says they can't get a minion from Craig's List. Abby's dairies make up a good portion of the novel. The diary entries are excellent and hilarious; from page 100, "I have to prove myself worthy of his trust, otherwise there's like no way he'll bestow the dark gift on me, and I'll totally have to finish my sophomore year and probably end up in junior college or working at Old Navy or something." The book follows Tommy, Jody and Abby as they bribe a local bum with alcohol so they can feed from him and battle the cops, the Animals, the vampire that turned Jody: Elijah Ben Sapir. Some of the San Fransisco characters readers have come to love from Moore's novels are back, like the Emperor and his dogs and Moore's characters are so good that even the fringe characters, like Abby's friend Jared, are extremely well done.

I did not realize until after I was about half way into You Suck that it was a sequel and felt like I was missing something. The story was explained well and you don't have to read the first book to understand You Suck, although it might help. Enjoy.

Cosmopolitan

2007-01-19T13:57:00.000-06:00

The introduction of Cosmopolitan: A Bartender's Life by Toby Cecchini takes place in a local bar in Eau Claire, WI so I thought, cool, this is going to be a good one. Turns out...not so much. I only got part way through this book because the writing and the story were just too much to take. The author struck me as trying to talk like a great writer while still keeping the street cred of a New York City bartender. The author also can't stop mentioning that he lived in France. It didn't really work for me. Take this quote from page 10 where the author is describing how his father made gin and tonics: "I always marveled at the élan with which he pulled off that simple action; my efforts at duplicating this maneuver always end with me bludgeoning the recalcitrant glacier mercilessly as chips fly helter skelter." I lived in France for a while too buddy, and I certainly don't feel the need to use French words because I can't bear to say "ice cube". It turns out that the author helped create the cosmo and grew to hate it after it became so popular, a fact that is covered later in the book. Perhaps I'm being too harsh and I should have given Cosmopolitan more of a chance, but there was just too much pretension to wade through.

World Changing

2007-01-12T15:57:00.000-06:00

The book World Changing A User's Guide for the 21st Century edited by Alex Steffen with a foreword by Al Gore is an almost 600 page encyclopedia of how we should be living in the 2000s. Modeled after the environmentally minded website, the book has chapters with information about shelter, cities, community, business, politics and the planet. If you want to know how to implement direct action, change to LED lightbulbs, learn the definition of sustainable tourism or know what country has the best school system (Finland), this book is the place to find the information you need. Although it is mostly about the environment and how to live while being ecologically friendly, there is a wealth of information to be found in the pages with book, blog, website and organization references accompanying the chapters. One of my favorite information tidbits I found was in the "connecting with others" section found in the politics chapter (pgs 429-430). It explains the Fahamu project in Africa which uses information technology to teach distance learning courses and publish a newsletter. They also established a text messaging campaign for ending poverty. The book is full of cool inspiring stories like that. There are also lots of great pictures. And finally, for the book nerd in all of us, there is an index and a bibliography so it's really easy to use. Check out the website if you can't get your hands on the book because it's constantly being updated and it's easier to read than a 600 page hardcover book.

The Book of Joe

2007-01-08T20:28:00.000-06:00

I almost couldn't believe it when I realized that I hadn't reviewed this novel on here yet, it's one of the funniest books I've read in a while. So here we go.

In The Book of Joe by Jonathan Tropper, the title character, Joe Goffman, writes a tell-all novel about his hometown. In typical book fashion, all the things that made his life miserable in the small town of Bush Falls where he grew up make his book a huge success. Sixteen years later, Joe must return to his hometown, the setting of his novel (and subsequent movie) where most of the population wants to kill him. Joe's father is sick after a stroke and when Joe returns he finds his past catching up with him in the form of former high school sports stars turned town law enforcement. Another interesting part of his novel is Joe's relationships with the women in Bush Falls, his one true love Carly, the MILF Lucy and the football coach's wife who is upset that Joe cast the football coach as a chronic masturbator in his novel. She dumps a milkshake on Joe's head his first day back in town. Tropper crafts a funny and heart-warming novel while keeping the characters believable. If you're due for a good laugh, check this one out.

Madlands

2007-01-04T00:09:00.000-06:00

Take the classic Tales of the City series by Armistead Maupin, bring it to Madison, set it on Willy St instead of in Mrs. Madrigal's apartment building and change the decade from the 1970s to the 1980s. Instantly, you've created the book Madlands by J. Allen Kirsch. This book follows a group of loosely related characters through academia, sexuality, religion, jobs, drugs, weather and many events you may have experienced if you have ever lived in Madison, Wisconsin. Anything UW or Madison related is mentioned in this novel from the Farmer's Market, beers at the Union, walking down State Street, shopping at the Willy Street Co-op and the annual summer Art Fair to little things like the view of the lake from the Capitol before the Monona Terrace (which is funny to think about now). I enjoyed this book although there were some story issues - some lagged and others were dropped when the characters were no longer part of another's story. In the end though, it was really fun to get to read a good fiction book about the city I call home because The Dive From Clausen's Pier totally doesn't count.

SkyMaul

2006-12-26T22:50:00.000-06:00

I hope that everyone had a happy version of whatever holiday you celebrate this time of year. Also, before we begin today's review, I was sick of looking at the dark blue screen and not being able to tell where the links were in my posts. I hope this new template alleviates that problem.

So we all know how creepy/funny those airplane catalogs are. The comedy group Kasper Hauser has taken their absurdity to another level with the parody book SkyMaul - Happy Crap You Can Buy From a Plane. This book has fake ads for services like "You Can Set a World Record for How Happy You Are. Guaranteed." and the "Off My Back" Relationship Book Summaries. The products are all ridiculous items that do sort of remind you of the actual SkyMall catalog. In the parody book you will find the Cat's in the Cradle flask (engraved with the words "when you comin' home, Dad, I don't know when..."); Vegetarian-Be-Gone Totem (ward off vegetarians with this HUGE donkey head or elk head or whatever it is); Break it to them tastefully with our Medical Test Result Fortune Cookies (you tested positive for...). All the fake ads have descriptions and pictures of the products that all come with a severely bloated price tag. Of course this book, like many others I review, is silly and overall pretty pointless, but hey, it's funny.

Eat the Document

2006-12-21T16:05:00.000-06:00

Browsing through some of the best of the year books lists on Fimoculous, I came upon Eat the Document by Dana Spiotta on multiple lists and thought I'd check it out. The story of Mary Whitaker and Bobby DeSoto alternates between the 1970s and the 1990s and follows the lives of these two lovers turned fugitives. After a radical war protest event gone wrong, the pair are forced to part and go underground, changing their names and identities. Although what exactly happened is a mystery until the end of the book, the stories of the two, as they unknowingly reside in the same city and live their semi-normal lives with their children (in Mary/Louise's case) and their bookstores (Bobby/?????'s case) all while keeping their true selves a secret. There are two characters who might be Bobby and, at least in my case, I was almost sure I knew who Bobby had become but sometimes I doubted myself. That mystery made things confusing at times but also interesting. I enjoyed this novel and the fringe characters, Louise's son Jason and bookstore frequenter Miranda added a lot to the story. Spiotta is a wonderful writer who can craft a great story and writes in a truly literary manner. I'm intrigued to check out her first book, Lightning Field.

The Brick Testament

2006-12-18T22:03:00.000-06:00

Brendan Powell Smith, the notorious Internet celebrity also known as "The Reverend" has been kind enough to give the world a series of books that we didn't even know we had been waiting for. The Brick Testament: Stories from the Book of Genesis is the first book of the bible illustrated with LEGO characters. Luckily for us, Smith has grandiose plans to do the whole bible illustrated in this manner and so far has published three books including this one. It's so much easier to understand the bible when you can see the little yellow LEGO figure of Abel face down in his LEGO blood while God says to Cain, "Where is your brother Abel?" and Cain replies "I don't know" (page 49). Each page has the quotidian English "translation" of a bible verse and the verse number below it with a LEGO picture describing what is happening. For further reading, Powell Smith's related website is incredibly detailed and contains more stories than any of the books do.

Thanks to my coworker Kiki for pointing out the Cain and Abel page :)

Election

2006-12-14T23:34:00.000-06:00

I think that Tom Perotta is a great writer; he's funny and creates characters that are interesting, flawed and likable. His novel Little Children was very good and recently made into a movie that got nominated for three Golden Globes today. A while ago I decided I should read some of his other books since I liked Little Children so much.

Although I have never seen the movie Election, I really enjoyed the book which is Perotta's second novel. This book follows a teacher and a few students during an election for high school student body president. The book is presented in one of my favorite formats where one character narrates each chapter. The politically ambitious Tracy Flick is pitted against the popular jock Paul Warren in the beginning of the fight until Paul's sister joins the race. Tammy, the sister, is in love with Paul's girlfriend and is probably the most intriguing character in the novel. Her chapters are full of teen angst and present a lot of drama. The history teacher, Jim McAllister narrates some of the chapters and his point of view of the election and his life are both interesting. This is a short novel and the whole time the reader is dying to know who wins, but in the end gets a good story along the way.

Theme: Broadway musical coffee table books

2006-12-09T23:09:00.000-06:00

I love Broadway musicals, they're my guiltiest pleasure and I can't get enough of the music, the shows and the books. Unfortunately, my dear readers have to suffer through countless (okay, two so far) Broadway musical book reviews. I figured I'd spare you all the pain and do a theme review featuring many Broadway musical coffee table books in one post thereby sparing my readers any more musical book reviews. Well, I'm not promising anything, but I'll try to hold back after this.

Someone caught on that Broadway musical fans of the 2000s like the musicals so much that not only will they get suckered into buying tickets to the show and the soundtrack, they'll buy books too! RENT was the first Broadway book to come out with the show, because RENT is the coolest. Following the RENT book's lead, other recent or current shows released books that include the lyrics, book, interviews with actors and producers, lots of pictures and information about putting the show together. I reviewed the Wicked book and was positive about it. But the more I explored Amazon after getting my Avenue Q e-newsletter (I know, I'm hopeless) about their new coffee table book, I realized these were just the tip of the iceberg. In addition to RENT, Wicked and Avenue Q having coffee table books out, Hairspray, The Color Purple, The Producers and Mama Mia! also have them. And, if that weren't enough, the PBS documentary Broadway, An American Musical also has a companion book. It's almost too much, even for me.

That said, if you actually enjoy Broadway musicals, I hope I'm not disappointing you by lumping everything together. If you don't, feel free to jump for joy now. And speaking of... if you're a musical fan you should check out the PBS documentary because it's a really interesting presentation on the history of Broadway.

Food Court Druids, Cherohonkees...

2006-12-06T23:58:00.000-06:00

Robert Lanham created The Hipster Handbook in 2003 and made a name for himself among New Yorkers and people curious about what exactly classified a "hipster". The book did not impress actual hipsters because they were so over being labeled and the book didn't apply to them anymore (or so they say). So at the end of 2004 Lanham released Food Court Druids, Cherohonkees, and Other Creatures Unique to the Republic and looked to appeal to a new audience - everybody. All readers are familiar with a "WB" - someone who strongly identifies with Bugs Bunny and wears only Warner Brothers clothing, in my experience they're always jean shirts. This book presents idiosyncrology groups which are further divided into specific types of people like the obvious gym people, the not-so-obvious yanknecks (rebel-flag-waving rednecks who live outside the South) and the hilarious CATSCANs (Cannot Attempt to Socially Categorize, Anthropologically Noteworthy). One of the CATSCANs is Mary Hart, noteworthy because she does not age and has a $1 million insurance policy on her legs. Another is Randy Constan who, despite working as a computer programmer, routinely dresses like Peter Pan and has become somewhat of a celebrity in the process. He has a website and a Wikipedia page and I remember seeing him on Conan a few years ago. Although this book is kinda silly, it's pretty entertaining because every type of person you read about, you think about the last time you went grocery shopping and find yourself nodding and laughing.

My Year Of Meats

2006-12-02T09:53:00.000-06:00

Although Ruth L. Ozeki's My Year of Meats was published in 1999, it has themes relevant to today's society and presents a story unlike any other novel I've read. The two main characters are women involved with the Japanese show My American Wife!, a television documentary show actually designed to promote meat products in Japan and not showcase American families like the viewers are led to believe. The producer of the show is Jane Takagi-Little, a character based heavily on the author's actual experiences as a documentary film maker. Jane travels cross-country making shows and slowly discovers the ugly underbelly of the meat industry - lots of hormones in the meat which are affecting the consumers. Once she realizes this, Jane begins to sabotage the program slowly. The other main character is Japanese Akiko Uneo whose husband runs the advertising for My American Wife! Akiko sees an episode of the show that focuses on vegetarian lesbians (one of Jane's first deviations), wants to help Jane and the two spend the rest of the novel trying to expose the meat industry. Overall, this novel has a lot to cover but it keeps the reader interested while examining cultural differences, different kinds of exploitation, gender roles and relationships.

A few non book items

2006-11-29T20:43:00.000-06:00

Instead of reviewing a book today, I thought I'd post a few things that are on my mind.

1. A thank you is in order to the Urban Dictionary site which posted my review on the press portion of their site. Thanks guys :)

2. The Onion has an awesome new addition to their AV Club. It's called the Tolerability Index: A Guide to What We're Barely Putting Up With This Week and it is excellent, check it out.

3. Speaking of The Onion, Dan Savage is doing his podcast this week slightly drunk from a Thanksgiving day dinner party. It's pretty hilarious.

4. If you are a girl and grew up in the 90's you probably read The Babysitters Club books by Ann M. Martin. If you did, you should check out the BSC Headquarters blog because it's really well done and includes totally rad "fashion" descriptions from the books.

5. This site doesn't have much to do with anything except that it's funny. Cracked magazine's website presents an 80's movie montage hall of fame here.

Back to book reviewing soon.

Book Lust

2006-11-26T21:40:00.000-06:00

Nancy Pearl is as much of a rock star as one can be among librarians. She's the Former Executive Director of the Washington Center for the Book at The Seattle Public Library and retired in August of 2004. She also has the good fortune of being the model for the librarian action figure. Overall, she's a cool chick who knows lots about books. Her forte is readers advisory which basically means she's getting the right books into the right hands. Her two reference books dedicated to this subject are Book Lust: Recommended Reading for Every Mood, Moment and Reason and More Book Lust: Recommended Reading for Every Mood, Moment and Reason. The reading guides are divided into topics like I am Woman - Hear Me Roar - stories about women's liberation, too good to miss authors, and hilariously, Dick Lit. "Face it - if publishers had had the guts to call this subgenre what it really is - Dick Lit - rather than the wimpy sounding Lad Lit, it might've had a chance to succeed," Pearl says on page 78 of More Book Lust. These books have great book ideas and if you don't like them you can always follow Pearl's rule of 50: if you don't like a book by page fifty, you can stop reading it. Also check out Pearl's book lust wiki here.

The Commitment

2006-11-19T23:29:00.000-06:00

Dan Savage's latest book The Commitment: Love, Sex, Marriage and My Family was published in 2005 and focuses on gay marriage. Savage and his partner Terry have a child together, are about to celebrate their tenth anniversary and aren't quite sure how they want to. Dan's mother, a life-long Christian, wants them to get married; Terry prefers matching tattoos and their son DJ doesn't think it's allowed for his dads to get married. Savage takes the readers through a discussion of gay marriage with regards to the relationships of his friends, other families and sets it well within the tone of the United States. As with Savage's other books, portions of this book are laugh out loud funny; but this one presents an honest and thought-provoking look at an important issue. The ending is surprising and the book-long tattoo debate is solved in an amusing fashion. Publisher's Weekly says it best, "this timely book shows that being pro-family doesn't have to mean being anti-gay."

Literacy and Longing in L.A.

2006-11-15T14:28:00.000-06:00

The first book by both Jennifer Kaufman and Karen Mack, Literacy and Longing in L.A. is a different form of chick lit. The story presents the main character Dora as a flawed heroine who is dealing with her second divorce, this time from ex-husband Palmer and the loss of her job at the L.A. Times. In addition to a crippling fear of freeway driving, Dora tries to deal with her new life and a new relationship with bookstore worker hottie Fred. She forges a relationship with Fred's mother Bea and his niece Harper and in these scenes finds what was missing from her relationship with her own alcoholic mother. When Dora is feeling down due to the craziness in her life, instead of eating or drinking too much, she goes on book benders. These make Dora extremely literary minded and have her and Fred quoting books and poetry for much of the novel. Although this sounds like it could get annoying and pretentious, I liked it. The quotes are always footnoted which is great because it saves trying to get to a computer to look it up and each chapter begins with an appropriate quote about reading. The ending of the book leaves something to be desired, but perhaps a sequel is in the works. Overall, this book was a good literary antidote to the typical chick lit book and a witty, quick read.

Television Without Pity Week, part deux

2006-11-12T10:58:00.000-06:00

A few of the writers from Television Without Pity have written novels or other books. One of these is Pamela Ribon, whose first novel is called Why Girls Are Weird. Ribon, the author of the very popular blog, pamie.com, modeled the book somewhat after her own life. The main character, Anna Koval, starts a blog out of boredom at her school library job. She wanted to be an actor, but that's not really working out, so she's taken this job as a fall back and sort of hates it. Anna, writing as "Anna K", turns out to be a hugely popular character and wins the hearts of teenage, college age girls and creepy guys alike. Throughout the book, Anna deals with her breakup from Ian, her emotionally manipulative ex-boyfriend who she pretends on her blog to still be dating; her father's fatal illness and her sudden fame as a blogger extraordinaire.

I liked the book for the most part, but had one major qualm with it. One of the people that starts writing to Anna K is a guy by the screen name of LDobler (as the TWoP people would say: like, ha ha...not). Kurt (his real name) and Anna begin flirting over email and IM and instead of Kurt coming across as funny, quirky and a nice antidote to Ian; he comes across as totally creepy and stalkerish. This almost ruined the book for me, but in the end I did enjoy it. You can also check out the follow up, Why Moms Are Weird.

Television Without Pity Week

2006-11-08T23:16:00.000-06:00

Welcome to the first of a series of two posts this week pertaining to what might just be my favorite website: Television Without Pity. Television Without Pity started as a site called Dawson's Wrap that recapped Dawson's Creek; it eventually grew into the totally rockin' website it is now. On it you can find recaps of most dramas and reality tv shows on today, also they have well-moderated forums and archives of anything that was recapped at one time. Their authors do a really good job plus they're smart and funny.

Very rarely do I buy a book; I'm at a public library almost every day for work and I don't cook, so it seems silly for me to own many books. I was also brought up by a public librarian who I would rebel against by buying books when I was in high school - nerd alert. All of this said, I bought Television Without Pity: 752 Things We Love To Hate (And Hate To Love) About TV by Tara Ariano and Sarah D. Bunting and boy am I glad that I did. The book is set up in dictionary form and alphabetized (yay). It's awesomely dedicated to Ian Ziering and has so many entries that make me laugh and remember the show/character/Dawson's Creek reference. The authors do a good job of including actors, characters, typical tv situations, specific shows and catch phrases. All of that information is presented in a funny way and goes well with entries like "Fashion: Hilarious Attempts of TV Guys in the 90s At", "Cool: TV Signifiers Of", "Pregnancy: Cliches Associated With". If you're a TV junkie who grew up in the 80s and 90s, this book is definitely for you. If not, check out the website anyway it's worth it.

The Dog Dialed 911

2006-11-05T13:35:00.000-06:00

When you have a very successful website that is about to turn ten years old, why not create a book to go with it? That's probably what the cool kids over at The Smoking Gun were thinking this year. The Dog Dialed 911: A Book of Lists from The Smoking Gun by The Smoking Gun came out a few weeks ago and overall it's pretty fun. It includes lists like 3 dopes who reported their drugs stolen, 2,130 reasons why Rush Limbaugh has trouble recalling 2003, 2 youthful indiscretions by Dick Cheney (DUIs twice in an eight month period - although we all know it would get worse for ol' Buckshot Cheney) and 854 pairs of purloined panties (by Wisconsin's own Anthony Scholfield). Similar to the website, the book has mug shots and court documents with the good parts highlighted in yellow. It's divided into sections where lucky Bill O'Rielly gets his very own. The introduction says it best, this book is "an entertaining romp through a decade spent on the paper trail".

The Bad Girl's Guide to the Party Life

2006-11-02T23:48:00.000-06:00

Recently I uncovered a classic pop culture book, The Bad Girl's Guide to the Party Life. This series of books, written by Cameron Tuttle includes three other Bad Girl's guides, to the open road, to getting personal and to getting what you want. They're all very shiny: either pink or sparkly silver. The series also spawned a set of diaries, journals and calendars when they were popular in the late 90s/early 00s. The books are fun and filled with quirky lists like the truth about men and their shoes - "skater sneaks: he thinks it says no one tells me how to dress, it really says no one told me this was a grown-up party". It also has lists of accessories, different kinds of parties to throw, reasons to crash a party, "bad girl" ways to decline invitations and my favorite - the instant party girl alias finder. "Your exotic foreign name is your favorite spice and your last vacation spot." The concept sounds good but somehow mine, Sage Milwaukee, didn't come out quite as sexy as I think it's supposed to.

Unfortunately, the website listed in the back of the book doesn't work any more, but since this was one of the first specifically popular culture books I got as a gift, I figured it would be appropriate to review here.

Winkie

2006-10-31T23:01:00.000-06:00

The Publishers Weekly review of Winkie puts the author Clifford Chase "in the same league as David Sedaris". Unfortunately, that nice designation could not be farther from the truth. The book is about a teddy bear who finds himself in a cabin in the woods being captured by the FBI and charged with thousands of counts of treason and terrorism. Throughout the beginning of the book, Winkie discusses how he used to be a she when he was owned by the mother of his current owner and the moment he realized he could speak. Confused and bewildered? Yeah, so was I. This book not only wasn't as funny as Sedaris' books, it wasn't funny at all. It was silly and didn't at all live up to the hype of many starred reviews.

The Guy Not Taken

2006-10-29T12:52:00.000-06:00

Jennifer Weiner has had much success with her four previous chick lit books, one of which was made into a movie that I liked as much as the book. Of course it didn't hurt that cutie Mark Feuerstein was in it. I have read all of her novels and really enjoyed them. It seems though that her latest book, The Guy Not Taken: Stories, was hastily thrown together to capitalize on her success and get a book out quickly. Many of the stories were previously published in magazines and although they were all good, none of them were as satisfying as her books. Short story collections can be tricky because there is not enough time to develop the characters and it's difficult to make the tales meaningful. It seems that problem is what happened here. After finishing this book, I felt unsatisfied and longed for another of Weiner's novels with their strong, funny female leads and quick, witty pop culture references. Maybe next year.

The Baby Name Wizard

2006-10-26T13:21:00.000-05:00

I'll admit right off the bat that I haven't read the book The Baby Name Wizard by Laura Wattenburg, mostly because I have no use for baby names (thank goodness). It's supposed to have history and tons of good information about names. The part of the book that I really want to talk about is the website and the baby name wizard interactive "NameVoyager". The website has a graph that shows the popularity of baby names from the 1880s through 2005. It's very cool and fun to play around with and see the journey your name has taken. When you start typing in a name the graph grows and shows variations of the name as well as the name you typed in. Crazily enough, the book seems to have created an internet monster. There is the website, the book and a baby name wizard blog. Go look up your name and have fun.

101 Most Influential People Who Never Lived

2006-10-23T16:03:00.000-05:00

Last week or so there was a lot of blog buzz regarding a new book by Dan Karlan, Adam Lazar and Jeremy Salter called 101 Most Influential People Who Never Lived: How Characters of Fiction, Myth, Legends, Television, and Movies Have Shaped Our Society, Changed Our Behavior, and Set the Course of History. I wasn't going to blog about this book until I had actually gotten my hands on it, but then driving home last night I heard that this week on the 105.5 Triple M morning show, the hosts are going to be discussing it and who the authors may have left out. I figured since my readers (thanks friends, family and coworkers - all 5 of you) mostly live in Madison, it might be a good time to discuss this book on my blog so that if you listen to the morning show you'll be well informed (it streams online for those not in Madison).

The website for the book lists the first 50 people on the list and I feel as though they have done a fairly good job. I'm not sure that I agree with Hamlet being in the top 10, but overall, I think that the list looks pretty good. This book is an interesting pop culture idea; we are influenced by characters and I am excited to read the essays that accompany each person on the list. Hopefully I can catch some of the morning shows and see what Madisonians think about the list as well.

Slam Dunks and No Brainers

2006-10-22T16:55:00.000-05:00

I saw Leslie Savan on Friday night at Wisconsin Bookfest where she was talking about her latest book, Slam Dunks and No Brainers: Language in Your Life, the Media, Business, Politics and Like, Whatever. She was a very good speaker, she read from her book and explained the definition of "pop language" which is what her book is about. The book gives the central example of convincing the public that there were WMDs in Iraq; Bush's advisor said it would be a "slam dunk" and Bush went for it. Savan discusses the fact that we all use pop language, television shows have even gone so far as to substitute a well chosen phrase for a joke punch line. The book is an interesting look at the catch phrases, references and words that make up much of the way we all speak no matter how old or hip we are. The discussion on Friday night centered around young people despite the fact that the youngest people in the crowd (besides Savan's children) were my friend and I who are in our early twenties and despite the fact that Savan mentioned more than once that we all use pop language. It was still very interesting and people made some good points as to how to avoid using pop language. The book is thought provoking and worth checking out.

Urban Dictionary

2006-10-18T09:17:00.000-05:00

These days, it seems like some new slang term pops up every day. That's why it's good that we have the Urban Dictionary. When you're watching television, reading blogs or talking with friends and you're not quite sure what an acronym stands for or something means yet you don't want to look stupid by asking, the urban dictionary has your back.

The only problem with the online dictionary is that anyone can edit it and it's not as well maintained as Wikipedia, so it can get confusing at times. That's where the print version comes in handy. Urban Dictionary: Fularious Street Slang Defined by urbandictionary.com and Aaron Peckham is a compact 300 some page version of the website with over 2,000 terms, including the definition for fularious (combination of either funny or fucking and hilarious). Overall, a handy tool for any lack of urban knowledge.

Secret Society Girl

2006-10-15T11:31:00.000-05:00

While looking over my list of books I've read, I came across the novel Secret Society Girl: an Ivy League Novel by Diana Peterfreund. This book was pretty fluffy, but overall a fun quick read for a weekend. Amy Haskell, the main character, is a student at a fictitious Ivy League university called Eli when she gets "tapped" to be in the school's oldest and most prestigious secret society. This event marks the first year that women have ever been admitted to Rose and Grave so naturally controversy, mystery and of course romance ensue. More books will follow in what is to be a Secret Society Girl series and they'll be worth checking out.

Water For Elephants

2006-10-12T12:55:00.000-05:00

I just finished the wonderfully written novel, Water For Elephants by Sara Gruen. This book tells the story of Jacob Jankowski, a Cornell vet student, who after the death of his parents finds himself lost in the world and jumps a train. This train turns out to belong to the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth which Jacob manages to join as the country rolls through the Great Depression. The novel is written as two stories; the 23 year old Jankowski experiencing the circus and the 90 year old Jankowski remembering it. I loved this book and Gruen really did her research to make the circus real and the characters believably wicked. Overall, it's a great story.

The Revolution Will Be Accessorized

2006-10-09T11:16:00.000-05:00

According to their website, BlackBook magazine "stands out from the crowd by amplifying the most daring and inventive impulses in pop culture, and exploring the space where the underground meets the mainstream." Launched a decade ago in New York City, and still primarily serving that market, the magazine has just released a book of short stories that have appeared in their issues.

At first when I started reading The Revolution Will Be Accessorized: BlackBook Presents Dispatches from the New Counterculture edited by Aaron Hicklin, I was not pleased. Maybe it's just because I'm a hick Wisconsinite who knows nothing about culture, but I don't think so. The first short story was pretentious and assumed that the whole of the cool kids live in New York City or Los Angeles. I kept reading and enjoyed some of the stories and features where two authors or artists interview each other. The submissions by Augusten Burroughs, Chuck Palahniuk and Ryan Boudinot were the best in the book and I must admit that I skimmed through some of the other stories where the writers or artists were telling themselves how great they were or talking down to me. The problem with books like this is that they take themselves way too seriously while trying to be cool and cutting edge. The ultimate pretentious moment occurs during the interview with Douglas Coupland and Naomi Klein when they start the article by insulting BlackBook magazine itself. Coupland says, "It's so over the top that I don't think you can say it's like Elle or Vogue." Klein counters, "I bought the 'Protest Issue'...I was so repulsed I almost bailed from this discussion."

Maybe if you had, I would have liked the book better.

Plan B

2006-10-05T11:01:00.000-05:00

Jonathan Tropper's first novel, Plan B, is the story of a group of college friends reunited in a set of crazy circumstances. After a reunion in New York where Plan A goes awry, they decide to stage Plan B: an intervention for actor Jack's cocaine addiction. The group kidnaps Jack and takes him to the cabin of his best friend Alison, who has always wished their relationship could be more than platonic. During this time, the friends; Jack, Alison, the novelist narrator Ben who has just separated from his wife, free spirit Lindsay who happens to be Ben's ex-girlfriend, and insecure surgeon Chuck find themselves in a huge media frenzy. After the local police department figures out what is going on, the national media are not far behind. In addition to dealing with the feds, the friends find themselves backtracking to past romantic relationships and friendships. This book reminds me of a well-written movie that should have a soundtrack filled with cutting edge music and overall, I really enjoyed it.

The Amazing Mackerel Pudding Plan

2006-10-03T12:35:00.000-05:00

Author Wendy McClure found some Weight Watchers recipe cards from 1974 while cleaning out her parents basement a few years ago. The result is the hilariously disgusting book The Amazing Mackerel Pudding Plan: Classic Diet Recipe Cards From the 1970s. I had no idea this existed until this weekend when friends I was visiting mentioned it to me, and thank goodness. Some of the recipe cards can be found online here and that preview promises that the book is going to be great. McClure adds funny commentary to the creepy photo recipes of a myriad of jellied meats and fish with no nutritional information whatsoever. McClure even set up a flickr group of the recipes being made. With recipes for fish being described as "fluffy", you know that things are bad.

Stuff on My Cat

2006-10-02T00:55:00.000-05:00

Sometimes the Internet is a wonderful invention that makes our lives better, however; sometimes that's not the case. The "stuff on my cat" website is one of those things that we would never have without the Internet (like this) because it's too ridiculous to exist anywhere else. With the extremely catchy tag line of "stuff + cats = awesome", the website was started by a student who posted pictures of his cat with stuff on it and attracted submissions from other cat lovers. Unfortunately, for cats and humans alike, the madness has also spurned a book. Stuff on My Cat: The Book by Mario Garza is just like the website, it features pictures of cats from hundreds of readers with everything from whipped cream and cherries to wigs to tools on them. It also features an introduction describing the philosophy of stuff on my cat (whatever the hell that may be). I pretty much think this is a silly idea and don't really find it funny, but others do, so if you're a fan of the website, you probably want to check out the book when it is released in December.

Mom's Cancer

2006-09-28T11:46:00.000-05:00

When you think about graphic novels you don't normally think the subject matter is going to be terminal illness, but in the case of Mom's Cancer by Brian Fies, it is. The author's mother is diagnosed with lung cancer accompanied by a brain tumor after she suffers a "mini-stroke" and this graphic novel, originally started as a web-comic, is a gritty and true account of the treatment she goes through. This book does a good job detailing what the whole family is going through trying to figure out treatments and cope with cancer. Overall, Fies does a wonderful job of showing what it is really like to go through something horrible courageously and come out of it with dignity and hope.

This book is not the only graphic novel portrayal of cancer. Also check out Cancer Vixen: A True Story by Marisa Acocella Marchetto and Cancer Made Me a Shallower Person: A Memoir in Comics by Miriam Engelberg.

Theme: Widowed Women Baking

2006-09-26T11:47:00.000-05:00

There is seems to be not-so-secret template out there somewhere in which the protagonist of the novel has something happen to her significant other and she suddenly realizes that it is her life's ambition to open a bakery or work in one. There are three very good novels which use this plot and I enjoyed them all despite the fact that they are cut from the same mold.

Jeanne Ray's Eat Cake is the story of a woman who turns her ability to bake tasty cakes into relief from her crazy mother-in-law and husband's lack of a job. Ray's other books are very good, she's a fun writer who always tells a good story.

Lolly Winston's Good Grief has the main character widowed in her thirties. She manages, after finding herself waking up after eating a whole bag of Oreos, to pick herself up and get back out there. After becoming a Big Sister to a troubled teen, the protagonist starts her baking career.

Finally, Judith R. Hendricks' Bread Alone tells the readers about a woman who is kicked out by her husband in favor of a younger blonde. She moves to Seattle where a friend lives and takes a job in a local bakery. She meets a handsome bartender and her life too goes on. The sequel to this, The Baker's Apprentice, is also good.

Me Talk Pretty One Day

2006-09-24T22:13:00.000-05:00

One could say that David Sedaris is just another author who has made a great career out of writing about his family but he's much more than that. His books are always funny and a great read, you'll for sure enjoy his social and family commentary. In Me Talk Pretty One Day, he writes short stories on all things from his life focusing in the first part of this book on his childhood and instances from his younger days. In the second part, he discusses his new life in France with often hilarious language barrier issues. Overall, there's not much to say about this book other than it's one of my favorites because it is very funny and worth it for a good laugh and a pick-me-up any time.

Self-Made Man

2006-09-22T15:44:00.000-05:00

A quick note before I begin...I don't usually read books that I don't like. I always figure that life is too short to read bad books, but sometimes I just get too far into a book to quit. The vast majority of the reviews you're going to find on here are positive, but occasionally I do read books that I don't like, so you get to hear about some of those too.

Self-Made Man: One Woman's Journey into Manhood and Back by Norah Vincent is a memoir with interesting concept. Vincent was to become a man for over a year by dressing differently, using fake stubble and other adjustments to her appearance. She decides that during this time she's going to examine gender differences by joining various all-male groups. Vincent, as "Ned", bowls with a league, joins a monastery for a while as a guest, dates women, sells things door to door and generally learns to pass with her attitude and confidence more than her disguise. All of this is interesting, but not earth shattering. The problem with the book is that at the end Vincent has a psychological breakdown and focuses on that without really wrapping up the book in any way. Although I am of course sympathetic, I don't like it in memoirs when authors talk about their personal lives if the book is really about something else. This book didn't really have an ending and overall, this is one of the books that I sort of got suckered into finishing despite my dislike.

Skipping Towards Gomorrah

2006-09-20T17:03:00.000-05:00

I love Dan Savage. His column, Savage Love, has been running for a long time and it's always hilarious and helpful. I had the joy of seeing him last fall when he was promoting his last book, The Commitment, which is awesome and I will probably review on here eventually. All that said, I had never read any of his books until a while ago and was delighted when I started with Skipping Toward Gomorrah: The Seven Deadly Sins and the Pursuit of Happiness. A play on the title of conservative Robert H. Bork's book Slouching Towards Gomorrah: Modern Liberalism and American Decline, Savage's book is quite the undertaking. He decides to commit the seven deadly sins in spectacular fashion: he goes to a fat acceptance conference, hangs out with couples involved in "the lifestyle", visits a retreat, visits Las Vegas and more all in the course of seven chapters (each devoted to a sin). His conclusion is that the people he meets who are pursuing their happiness in the way they choose are not hurting anyone and Savage wishes government would get off their (and his and our) back. Savage brings his usual low tolerance for bull shit and high quotient of humor and wit to this book and makes it interesting and funny.

The Girls

2006-09-18T12:09:00.000-05:00

Lori Lansens' latest book, The Girls: A Novel is the story of conjoined twins, Ruby and Rose Darlen, joined at the head and sharing an essential vein so they can never be separated. They were born during a tornado that had devastating consequences for their little Canadian town and are members of the community where everyone refers to them as "the girls". The novel is written mostly from the point of view of Rose who started at age 29 on the cusp of the girls becoming the world's oldest conjoined twins. Occasional chapters by Ruby are interspersed and the reader quickly finds that Ruby's chapters are going to provide information necessary to Rose's stories and the plot of the novel. This book is written beautifully and the character development is wonderful, by the end you feel you know the girls as well as other members of their town: their parents, Aunt Lovey and Uncle Stash who adopted them and raised them to be as normal as possible, their neighbors the Merkels who lost their only son in the tornado, and other neighbors Nick and Nonna whom they care for and who care for them. The adventures of the girls and their love for each other is what makes the book so interesting and keeps you reading. Overall, Lansens presents a beautiful story of sisters and best friends.

Wicked: The Grimmerie

2006-09-16T14:20:00.000-05:00

After reviewing two books about death, I figured it was time to move on to something lighter.

There is something about the story of the Wizard of Oz that has captivated people for over a hundred years. From movies to books to musicals, L. Frank Baum's first Oz book is a story that almost everyone is familiar with and loves (except for those traumatized as children by the flying monkeys). When Gregory Maguire wrote Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West in 1995, it got a following and years later was made into the musical Wicked. The musical, although it lost the best musical Tony to Avenue Q, became a huge hit and has set up permanent runs in Los Angeles, Chicago and London. The companion book to the musical is Wicked: The Grimmerie, a Behind the Scenes Look at the Hit Broadway Musical by Joan Marcus and David Cote. The book is designed to look like the spell book that the main character, Elphaba, the witch (her name is a play on L. Frank Baum's initials) uses throughout the show. In it you will find things that fans of the show want to see: information about the sets, costumes, songs, writing process, commentary from the actors, directors, writers, fans and tons of pictures. I saw the musical last summer and loved it and the Grimmerie brought back all the memories about what was cool about the show. Any fan of Wicked (the book, musical or both) will like this book and be interested in everything it takes to put on a Broadway show.

A Dirty Job

2006-09-15T11:05:00.000-05:00

Christopher Moore has achieved a cult following with his novels. I had never read one until this summer and decided to check him out. A Dirty Job starts with the birth of Charlie Asher's daughter Sophie and the death of his wife Rachel. Shortly after Rachel dies Charlie sees a man dressed in green taking her favorite CD (now pulsing and glowing strangely) from the hospital room. Although Charlie tries to stop him and make sense of it all, he finds out that he is about to undertake (sorry, too easy) the job that this strange man has: Charlie is going to be a Death Merchant. Luckily the man turns out to be Minty Fresh, who, along with the Big Book of Death, helps Charlie get acquainted to his new business collecting "soul vessels" and passing them onto new recipients as part of the circle of life. Minty owns a used CD store and Charlie owns a second hand store, making the task of passing on soul vessels a little easier. The novel covers daughter Sophie's first five years where two huge black hell hounds join her and will not leave her side, even in the bathtub. During this time Charlie, a self-described beta male, battles against the sewer harpies who live underground, want to steal the soul vessels and constantly try to flirt with Charlie through the gutters of San Fransisco. With many well developed characters, Charlie's co-workers especially, this book takes the reader on a crazy fantastical journey of life, death, humor and junk. Definitely worth the read if you're looking for something funny that's a little different.

A Long Way Down

2006-09-14T11:28:00.000-05:00

Nick Hornby's latest novel A Long Way Down is the story of four unlikely friends who meet one New Year's eve on the roof of a building they are all intending to jump off. The four characters are Jess, a teenager who is upset about her boyfriend and politician father; J.J., a musician whose career has ended badly; Martin, a talk show host fraught with scandal; and Maureen, the mother of a handicapped son. With each chapter this quartet becomes better friends and gets each other through their lives with some more scandal and lots of introspection. Each character takes turns narrating the chapters so the reader learns a lot about everyone before the book ends. Hornby, in his typical way, finds a way to make a novel about suicide and death funny while still asking questions about life and what it all means. Overall, this book is great and a good read for teens and adults alike.