2012 – Page 7 – Pop Culture Nerd

First Impressions 5.11.12

Time for another sampling of opening passages from the books in my TBR pile, a regular Friday feature here at PCN. As some of you know, I go straight to the first page of the ARCs I receive before reading any accompanying press materials because the book itself needs to draw me in. If it’s a long description of weather or scenery, I’m usually done with it before I even start.

Here are this week’s openers for your perusal:

Heart of a Killer by David Rosenfelt, Minotaur, out now

Prologue

Detective John Novack knew something was wrong even before he stepped in the blood. Though he was a fourteen-year veteran of the force, in this instance his sense of foreboding did not come from an instinct finely honed by experience, nor was it a result of piecing clues together. The voice on the 911 call, as played back to him while he drove to the scene, had said it all.

“I killed Charlie Harrison.”

The Little Red Guard by Wenguang Huang, Riverhead, out now

At the age of nine, I slept next to a coffin that Father had made for Grandma’s seventy-third birthday. He forbade us from calling it a “coffin” and insisted that we refer to it as shou mu, which means something like “longevity wood.” To me, it seemed a strange name for the box in which we’d bury Grandma, but it served a practical purpose. It was less spooky to share my room with a “longevity wood” than with a big black coffin.

The 500 by Matthew Quirk, Reagan Arthur Books, out June 5

Prologue

Miroslav and Aleksandar filled the front seats of the Range Rover across the street. They wore their customary diplomatic uniforms—dark Brionis tailored close—but the two Serbs looked angrier than usual. Aleksandar lifted his right hand high enough to flash me a glint of his Sig Sauer. A master of subtlety, that Alex. I wasn’t particularly worried about the two bruisers sitting up front, however. The worst thing they could do was kill me, and right now that looked like one of my better options.

Which one(s) struck your fancy? Where do you think these books go from here?

Happy Friday and happy reading!

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Book Review: BLACKBIRDS by Chuck Wendig

This originally ran in Shelf Awareness for Readers, and is republished here with permission.

Miriam Black, the protagonist of Blackbirds, has the Dead Zone-ish ability to see a person’s future when she touches him or her, but Chuck Wendig takes it one step further by having her foresee only how and when the person dies. She becomes a grifter, paying visits to people she knows will kick the bucket and then taking their money so she can pay for food and shelter until her next target dies. Things get complicated when she runs into Ashley, a punk who wants in on her game, and meets Louis, a kindhearted truck driver whom she sees murdered in the near future while he utters her name. Does she somehow bring about his murder? And how can she stop it when the last time she tried preventing one of her visions, she ended up causing the death?

Wendig’s dark and twisty adventure is filled with misfit characters who defy easy stereotypes. Miriam is self-destructive, but she’s doing the best she can to survive the difficult hand life has dealt her. Louis, big as Frankenstein, shows Miriam more sweetness than she’s ever experienced. Stone-cold killer Harriet has a scene that makes readers understand her first kill; her story is even funny the first time it’s told.

Wendig inserts surprising moments of humanity among all the profanity. There’s a tale of a little boy and his balloon that should crack readers’ hearts. And despite fate being hell-bent on keeping her down, Miriam’s stubborn struggle to change it makes Blackbirds take flight.

Nerd verdict: Black, twisty tale with as much humanity as profanity

Buy it now from Amazon| Buy from an indie bookstore

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Fashion Roundup: The Met Gala 2012

On Monday night, some of the biggest stars in Hollywood and the fashion world attended the annual Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute gala in their fanciest duds. Some of the outfits were duds in another sense of the word, but there were also beautiful, edgy gowns on display. Check out my slide show below for a few highlights, then let me know what you think in the comments!

[cincopa AsOAq4qH3caS]

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First Impressions 5.4.12

May the Fourth be with you! You know I had to get that out of the way.

Now, for this week’s First Impressions, let’s add something new. After reading the following opening passages, leave a comment saying which ones would compel you to read more, but also guess where you think the stories are headed. I love seeing people’s different interpretations, and how we pick up on different details. I don’t have any idea what the real plots are because I’ve read only these openers, so we’re all in this game together.

Here goes:

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein, Hyperion, out May 15

I AM A COWARD.

I wanted to be heroic and I pretended I was. I have always been good at pretending. I spent the first twelve years of my life playing at the Battle of Stirling Bridge with my five big brothers—and even though I am a girl they let me be William Wallace, who is supposed to be one of our ancestors, because I did the most rousing battle speeches. God, I tried hard last week. My God, I tried. But now I know I am a coward. After the ridiculous deal I made with SS-Hauptsturmführer von Loewe, I know I am a coward. And I’m going to give you anything you ask, everything I can remember. Absolutely Every Last Detail.

The Demands by Mark Billingham, Mulholland Books, June 12

Chewing gum and chocolate, maybe a bottle of water on those hen’s teeth days when the sun was shining. A paper for the journey into work and half a minute of meaningless chat while she was waiting for her change.

Nothing there worth dying for.

Helen Weeks would tell herself much the same thing many times before it was over. In the hours spent staring at the small black hole from which death could emerge in less time than it took for her heart to beat. Or stop beating. In those slow-motion moments of terror that measured out each day and in the sleepless nights that followed. While the man who might kill her at any moment was shouting at himself just a few feet away, or crying in the next room.

It is not my time to die.

Or my baby’s time to lose his mother…

The Kings of Cool by Don Winslow, Simon & Schuster, June 19

[The numbers denote chapters.]

1.

Fuck me.

2. Laguna Beach, California

2005

Is what O is thinking as she sits between Chon and Ben on a bench at Main Beach and picks out potential mates for them.

“That one?” she asks, pointing at a classic BB (Basically Baywatch) strolling down the boardwalk.

Chon shakes his head.

A little dismissively, O thinks. Chon is pretty choosy for a guy who spends most of his time in Afghanistan or Iraq and doesn’t see much in the way of anything outside cammies or a burqa.

Actually, she can see how the burqa thing could be pretty hot if you played it right.

Did, you know, the harem thing.

Yeah, no.

OK, have at ’em!

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Movie Review: THE AVENGERS

My greatest concern about having so many superheroes crammed into one movie was that it’d be a disjointed mess, but Joss Whedon has managed to justify—for the most part—each character’s presence in The Avengers, and create a reasonably coherent summer blockbuster.

I’m not sure how important the plot is to you with this type of big action movie, but it involves Thor’s brother, Loki (Tom Hiddleston), being hellbent on ruling Earth and stripping earthlings of free will. He’s helped by a powerful energy cube called the Tesseract—also seen in last year’s Captain America: The First Avenger—and the alien race called Chitauri. Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), agent of S.H.I.E.L.D, manages to convince Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), Captain America (Chris Evans), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), The Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), and eventually Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) to band together as The Avengers to fight the evil invasion. Much action ensues, with lots of special effects, especially if you see it in 3D.

One of the best things the movie has going for it is Whedon’s trademark witty dialogue, with Downey Jr. getting the bulk of the funny lines, even though after a while, he does start to sound one-note with his endless snarky remarks. Ruffalo is my favorite movie Bruce Banner/Hulk yet. His soft-spoken manner contrasts nicely with his giant green angry guy, who has some funny scenes when he just won’t take any more bullsh*t. And thanks to motion capture technology, Ruffalo actually got to play the Hulk, who resembles the actor in facial expressions and hair.

Johansson has one badass fighting scene (you’ve probably seen it in one of the trailers) and is quite effective despite being the most petite team member with no actual superpowers or fancy costume. Hawkeye doesn’t get to do much, but Whedon does take him in an unexpected direction for the first half of the movie.

At two and a half hours, Avengers takes a little long to build up to the climactic battle, with a few pissing contests between the dudes before they agree to come together. And the finale looks a little like something from a Transformers movie, but these superheroes are a lot more interesting than robots, and with Whedon as their leader, they manage to save people’s brain cells from exploding by delivering an entertaining popcorn movie that doesn’t make you feel stupid.

Nerd verdict: Entertaining Avengers

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Inside Classic Films

Late last night, Deadline.com reported that Warner Bros. Digital Publishing will be releasing a series of eBooks that contain shooting scripts for classic films, with loads of extra content about each movie. The four announced titles are North by Northwest, Casablanca, Ben-Hur, and An American in Paris.

The extras on N by NW include the storyboards for that famous crop-duster scene, Hitchcock’s notes, costume sketches, and post-production memos. The Ben-Hur tome has excerpts from the journal Charlton Heston kept while shooting, makeup and wardrobe tests, and patent designs for MGM’s new widescreen camera. The Casablanca book details the origins of some of the film’s most famous lines, and contains memos from studio president Jack Warner. An American in Paris takes a look at the paintings that inspired the film’s dream ballet sequence and includes lyrics for the musical numbers. They all contain galleries of behind-the-scenes photos and glossaries of film terms.

The books are available for Kindle, Nook, and iBooks. (I’ve linked to the various booksellers above; click on “the editors of Warner Bros. Digital Publishing” to access the other titles from the same bookseller.) I’m aware this is beginning to sound like an infomercial, but no, I’m not getting paid to write this—I never get paid to write anything here—and am only an Amazon affiliate, meaning they’ll give me about thirty cents if you buy it from there.

I’m just excited about these books because they’re treasure troves for movie fans like me. I studied film in college but didn’t have access to this kind of behind-the-scenes information. I can’t wait to see what other titles will get the same treatment.

Are you as excited about these books as I am? Which titles would you like to see Warner Bros. release?

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First Impressions 4.27.12

Another Friday, another sampler of opening passages from books in my TBR pile to see which ones grab your attention right away.

For your perusal this week:

Long Gone by Alafair Burke, Harper, out June 19

Second Acts: Confessions of a Former Victim and Current Survivor

“3:14 IN THE MORNING”

It has been twenty years, but at three-fourteen this morning I screamed in my sleep. I probably would not have known I had screamed were it not for the nudge from my husband—my patient, sleep-starved husband, who suspects but can never really know the reasons for his wife’s night terrors, because his wife has never truly explained them.

I could see the uncertainty coloring his face this morning as he sipped his coffee, already going cold, while I poured a fresh cup for myself at the counter, carrying the carafe to the breakfast table to top off his cup. Not uncertainty about my reasons for screaming—that was ever-present—but uncertainty about whether even to raise the subject. Should I ask her? Are some subjects better left in the subconscious?

The Nightmare by Lars Kepler (translated by Laura A. Wideburg), Sarah Crichton Books, July 3

In the light of the long June night, on becalmed waters, a large pleasure craft is discovered adrift on Jungfrufjärden Bay in the southern Stockholm archipelago. The water, a sleepy blue-gray in color, moves as softly as the fog. The old man rowing in his wooden skiff calls out a few times, even though he’s starting to suspect no one is going to answer. He’s been watching the yacht from shore for almost an hour, as it’s been drifting backward, pushed by the lazy current away from land.

The man guides his boat until it bumps against the larger craft. Pulling in his oars and tying up to the swimming platform, he climbs the metal ladder and over the railing. There’s nothing to see on the afterdeck except for a pink recliner. The old man stands still and listens. Hearing nothing, he opens the glass door and steps down into the salon.

Criminal by Karin Slaughter, Delacorte, July 10

August 15, 1974

Lucy Bennett

A cinnamon brown Oldsmobile Cutlass crawled up Edgewood Avenue, the windows lowered, the driver hunched down in his seat. The lights from the console showed narrow, beady eyes tracing along the line of girls standing under the street sign. Jane. Mary. Lydia. The car stopped. Predictably, the man tilted up his chin toward Kitty. She trotted over, adjusting her miniskirt as she navigated her spiked heels across the uneven asphalt. Two weeks ago, when Juice had first brought Kitty onto the corner, she’d told the other girls she was sixteen, which probably meant fifteen, though she looked no older than twelve.

They had all hated her on sight.

Which opener(s) just made you add the book(s) to your TBR pile? (To see past samplers, click here and here.)

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Book Review: LET’S PRETEND THIS NEVER HAPPENED by Jenny Lawson

If you walk through the memoir section in bookstores, chances are you’ll find books by people who have no business writing a memoir, such as a twentysomething reality-show star whose biggest life struggle so far is being dumped by a vapid boy.

Jenny Lawson, also known as The Bloggess, is the opposite of that. She’s experienced enough wackiness in her thirty-eight years to fill Let’s Pretend This Never Happened (A Mostly True Memoir) with hilarious stories, and might even have some left over for a few more tomes.

Lawson’s book tracks her childhood in rural Texas, having pet raccoons and a taxidermist father who likes roadkill and armadillo racing; through meeting her husband Victor and working in HR for fifteen years; to having her daughter Hailey and finding female friends for the first time after she starts blogging.

If you’re a fan of Lawson’s blog, you don’t need to read any further because you’ve probably rushed out and bought the book already. If you’ve never read Lawson’s writing, be ready to laugh out loud at outrageous stories that seem almost too wacky to believe—her dog getting her stabbed by chicken, her dad throwing live bobcats on Victor at their first meeting—until she shows you photos. She has a singular way of viewing the world, and such an engaging way of drawing readers into her world, that you, too, might start mentioning vampire cougars and the zombie apocalypse in casual conversations with friends after reading this.

Lawson can be digressive in her storytelling, venturing down tangents that take you far from the starting point, but her detours are entertaining and she eventually comes back to her point. The fact she has a point is a plus (she can even find a lesson in being mauled by dogs), because I’ve read memoirs with anecdotes that go nowhere and have no discernible purpose. She does overuse the word “vagina,” which makes it lose its humor and shock value after a while, and don’t we want to preserve the value of “vagina”?

But it’s not all witticisms and irreverence. Lawson takes you into some dark corners, too—her miscarriages, panic attacks, the devastating pain from rheumatoid arthritis. It’s impressive how she manages to face life with her sense of humor intact. The title aside, she seems to embrace everything that’s happened to her, knowing it has made her who she is. She may be self-deprecating and call herself mentally unstable, but to her fans, she’s an inspiration.

Nerd verdict: Pretend is the real deal—hilarious and full of heart

Buy it now from Amazon| Buy it from an indie bookstore

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First Impressions 4.20.12

Last week I got several votes to make this a regular feature, so I’ll once again feature the opening passages of three upcoming books to see a) which ones you would read based on the intro alone, and b) if you can guess what the books are about. I try to select openers with something dynamic going on, and these fit the bill.

The Yard by Alex Grecian, Putnam, out May 29

London, 1889.

Nobody noticed when Inspector Christian Little of Scotland Yard disappeared, and nobody was looking for him when he was found. A black steamer trunk appeared at Euston Square Station sometime during the night and remained unnoticed until early afternoon of the following day. The porter discovered it after the one o’clock train had departed, and he opened the trunk when it proved too heavy for him to lift.

He immediately sent a boy to find the police.

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn, Crown, June 5

NICK DUNNE

THE DAY OF

When I think of my wife, I always think of her head. The shape of it, to begin with. The very first time I saw her, it was the back of the heard I saw, and there was something lovely about it, the angles of it. Like a shiny, hard corn kernel or a riverbed fossil. She had what the Victorians would call a finely shaped head. You could imagine the skull quite easily.

I’d know her head anywhere.

And what’s inside it. I think of that, too: her mind. Her brain, all those coils, and her thoughts shuttling through those coils like fast, frantic centipedes. Like a child, I picture opening her skull, unspooling her brain and sifting through it, trying to catch and pin down her thoughts. What are you thinking, Amy?

Cop to Corpse by Peter Lovesey, Soho Crime, June 12

Hero to zero.

Cop to corpse.

One minute PC Harry Tasker is strolling up Walcot Street, Bath, on foot patrol. The next he is shot through the head. No scream, no struggle, no last words. He is picked off, felled, dead.

The shooting activates an alarm over one of the shops nearby, an ear-splitting ring certain to wake everyone.

Which ones have your attention?

Happy Friday!

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Why Write the Great American Novel When You Can BE in One?

I saw this on Twitter this morning via @PenguinLibrary and thought it was such a fun idea, I had to share. Flavorwire had written an article about a service called U Star Novels that will allow you to insert yourself and your friends into classic novels, Mad Libs-style, for just $24.95. The clear choice for me would be The Hound of the Baskervilles because I’m a Holmesian nut, and second choice would be The Importance of Being Earnest, because it was one of the required-reading books in school I actually enjoyed. I’m also perusing the list of available titles to see which would make good gifts for my sisters, who had both been English majors.

But I also started thinking about which contemporary novels I’d like to insert myself in. Top of the list would probably be something by Robert Crais. If I’m Elvis Cole, that means Joe Pike’s my partner and who wouldn’t want that?? The Cat would also be mine. I’d also consider wedging myself into a Lee Child novel as Jack Reacher, because being a 6′ 5″ asskicking dude is not something I’d ever get to experience in real life.

So, which classic and contemporary novels would you “reimagine” starring yourself?

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Book Review: GETAWAY by Lisa Brackmann

A couple of weeks ago, I went on a little getaway to Morro Bay on the central California coast. I packed too many books as usual, but the one I decided to read was Lisa Brackmann‘s Getaway (Soho Press, May 1), since the title is apropos.

The story begins with Michelle Mason vacationing in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, after her husband dies suddenly. It’s the last fling she’ll enjoy before having to deal with the fiasco he had made of their financial affairs, something he had kept from her. She’s losing her home and will have to get a job—why not have some fun first?

She hooks up with an American named Daniel and takes him back to her hotel. Two men break into her room in the middle of the night and hurt Daniel badly enough for him to be hospitalized. From there, she becomes entangled with Mexican cops, drug dealers, and a creepy guy named Gary who coerces her to spy on Daniel without telling her who either of them is. She can’t leave the country until she does as Gary wants, but as her vacation quickly devolves into a nightmare, Michelle may not leave Mexico alive.

The novel is compulsively readable, with Brackmann keeping the pace tight and readers in the dark along with Michelle. The author also captures both the beauty of Puerto Vallarta—you can almost feel the sun and sand on your skin—and its sinister underbelly.

Michelle, however, is a frustrating heroine. She’s mostly a passive character, reacting to events more than being proactive about getting herself out of the bad situation. This is understandable to some extent because her hands are figuratively and literally tied at times, but even when she does have a modicum of control, she still makes unwise choices. A party girl she barely knows asks Michelle to meet her at a seedy club late at night and Michelle goes, then gets in trouble when she leaves the joint much later because there are no more taxis running. Yes, she was hoping the girl had some intel for her, but perhaps she could’ve tried to negotiate a meeting time during the day? She also drinks too much when she knows she needs to stay clearheaded because her life might depend on it. Overall, though, Getaway is like a vacation fling—it may not leave a deep impression, but it’s diverting enough while it lasts.

Nerd verdict: Diverting Getaway

Buy it from Amazon| Buy it from an indie bookstore

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First Impressions 4.13.12

Last Friday I did a post on the opening passages of the books I was reading. I received positive feedback from readers who enjoyed those glimpses so I decided to do it again this week.

When I receive ARCs, I go straight to the first paragraphs or pages before reading any of the accompanying press materials. Any book that begins with long descriptions of the weather or scenery usually goes in the donation pile. These are three openers that didn’t mention trees or rain:

Afterwards by Rosamund Lupton, Crown, out April 24

I couldn’t move, not even a little finger or a flicker of an eye. I couldn’t open my mouth to scream.

I struggled, as hard as I could, to move the huge hulk that my body had become, but I was trapped under the hull of a vast ship wrecked on the ocean floor and moving was impossible.

My eyelids were welded shut. My eardrums broken. My vocal cords snapped off.

Pitch-dark and silent and so heavy in there; a mile of dense water above me.

Only one thing for it, I said to myself, thinking of you, and I slipped out of the wrecked ship of my body into the black ocean.

I swam upwards towards the daylight with all my strength.

Alpha by Greg Rucka, Mulholland Books, May 22

Mario Vesques was sure he was going to make it, right up until he saw the knife in the dog’s hand.

He had no idea where the blade came from; what he did have was just enough time to realize he was in trouble, and then the cartoon animal was lunging at him in a way that Vesques recognized, had seen before, but yet couldn’t immediately place. Only as he got his left forearm up for a cross-block, felt the tip of the knife nicking skin as it split his sleeve, did it click.

What Comes Next by John Katzenbach, Mysterious Press, June 5

As soon as the door opened, he knew he was dead.

He could see it in the quickly averted eyes, in the small slump of the shoulders, the nervous, hurried manner as the doctor moved rapidly across the room. The only questions that immediately leaped to his mind were: How much time do I have? How bad would it be?

Based only on these opening passages, which would compel you to read further? Would you be interested in my doing this as a regular feature?

Happy Friday the 13th!

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