Book Dominoes

A cool commercial for Bookmans in Arizona. Thanks to Boing Boing.

Boston Area Book Report

spooky time

The Boy Who Couldn't Die

by William Sleator

early influences

I read these two books in high school. What does that say about me? I got them both off of my dad's bookshelf. They are both journalistic masterpieces, but my favorite is the gonzo exploits of Hunter S. Thompson in Las Vegas. It is one of the very few books that I've ever read more than once.
Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test was the true story of the development of LSD and it's connection to Ken Kesey and The Grateful Dead. I got lost in this book and it took me forever to read. I don't even really remember how it ended. I might have found it's lucid, coherent narration to be perhaps a bit dry and uncompelling. Whereas with Thompson, you can literally feel the madness, seeping off the page.
Both good reads, and perhaps a little bit influential to me at that age.

let's go

more books

I went by the used bookstore today. I found these three:

1. The Iron Dream by Norman Spinrad. I heard that this book was banned in Germany because it was written from the point of view of Adolph Hitler, if Hitler had been a sci-fi writer instead of a dictator.
2. As She Climbed Across the Table by Jonathan Lethem. I liked Gun, With Occasional Music, but not quite as much as The Wall of the Sky, The Wall of the Eye. I like his stuff better than Michael Chabon's. I don't know why I compare the two. Perhaps because I've read 2 by each author and I've got another left to read by each.
3. Born to Rock by Gordon Korman. Another by my favorite YA writer. I couldn't resist the description on the back cover. A young republican falls from grace, finds out his dad is a punk rocker and becomes a roadie for his dad's band. On the front cover is a baby with a mohawk.

Vast Active Living Intelligence System

VALIS by Philip K. Dick

20 Minutes into the Future.

From Max Headroom

gun, with occasional music

gun, with occasional music

by Jonathan Lethem

books for beginners

Thanks for this pic, boing boing!

adult books

mein kampf

Strange Attractors

Strange Attractors by William Sleator

aspiring author

I started a new blog this week. It's called "scenes from nowhere", and it's all short stories, written by me. I have another writing blog that I've been working on for a while, called "Green Twilight". That one is a science fiction novel that I originally started for NaNoWriMo, but failed to complete it before the one month deadline. However, I continued to write on it, off and on, ever since. I realize that I am not the greatest writer in the world. I'm certainly good at procrastination, otherwise I'd have finished Green Twilight long ago and started on another novel. Also it's difficult to continue writing on the same work, constantly for weeks or months at a time. I started the new blog, specifically as a place to put the best little short stories I could muster in one place. Instead of having them lying around in old notebooks all over my house. I publish them now in the hopes that they will be read and enjoyed and perhaps, one day be published in true book form.

Bad Monkeys

Bad Monkeys by Matt Ruff
This is not the same cover as the one I have.
I did a google image search for this book and liked this one better.
I have the yellow cover with what looks like 4 Darth Vader helmets,
from a distance.