Book Review: Night Terrors

    Author Ashley Cardiff is quite clearly completely insane.  But believe me, I mean that in the best possible way.  Her upcoming book is referred to as a ‘sex memoir’ in a couple places.  Well, that’s not quite accurate.  It’s sure not a sex guide.  Heck, though sex is one of the main topics in many if not all of the chapters, in one way or another, I don’t thing the book is actually about sex.  Well, it is.  But it’s about others stuff, too.  And it’s laugh out loud funny more often than not.

    Do ‘bad words’ bother you?  Do you get uncomfortable hearing about penises and vaginas?  If so, you should probably skip this book and focus instead on growing up.  To say it’s frank would be something of an understatement.  Cardiff is frequently quite crass, but in that exasperated way one gets when tired of talking to prudes, when you crank it to 11 to try to shake the dust off.  Her story of discovering sex in its various forms throughout childhood and her teen years is earnest and heartfelt, even while she’s coldly picking apart herself and everyone around her.

    As someone who grew up in the late 70s and 80s, in the shadow of the Cold War not the War on Terror, who still thinks of the internet as something new, and who was already painfully out of step with his own generation anyway, I found her account of growing up in the new tech age interesting.  The little things, like the internet or cell phones that are simply a part of the background, taken for granted.  Different ideas on pop culture and social changes.  Even though she’s only a generation younger than me (if I gauge her age right, and have a proper grasp on what a generation is in this day) and I have many friends of her generation, it is the first intimate, personal memoir I have read from someone younger than me, and it’s fascinating as well as seriously funny.  There are darker moments like being stuck in a destructive relationship, being taken advantage (and nearly much more) by a sexual predator, and the things one sees while walking down a nice neighborhood in New York City.  Yet no matter how ugly something was, a page later I’d be laughing at her awkward frustration at being thought a homophobe because she didn’t like a gay man (not because he was gay, but because he was an asshole), her unpleasant relationships with significant others’ parents, her philosophical wrestling with pubic hair, and the time she almost got tricked into an orgy.

    The book trails off a bit in the final chapters as she seems to halfheartedly attempt to excuse her decision to write the book in the first place, drops a few hints about hopes for the future, etc.  But it’s still a completely readable and fun book, with a great deal of the nitty-gritty, uncomfortable and stupid things we do to each other and to ourselves in the pursuit of and fear of love, sex, and human connections.

Night Terrors: Sex, Dating, Puberty, and Other Alarming Things
Author: Ashley Cardiff
Publisher: Gotham Books
ISBN: 978-1-592-40786-6

-Matt

Comic Review: Fables Volume 1

    This isn’t really a new concept.  It’s been done several times actually.  The people and creatures of fables, myths, and literature have all fled their lands and now live in New York (it always seems to be New York).  They’re trying to keep their existence secret, while attempting to deal with life as exiles.  The art is pretty good, I guess.  Though nothing special.

Remember us?

    The first arc is a murder mystery of sorts, introducing several of the major players in the series (I guess).  Bigby Wolf used to be the Big Bad Wolf, but now he lives as a sadsack cop.  Snow White is a government official.  Bluebeard is a wealthy businessman.  Prince Charming is a bed hopping, chronic mooch.  Jack is a deadbeat.  And it goes on. 

    The second arc follows a revolution among the non-human looking fables, who are forced to live on The Farm, where they can stay out of the sight of humanity.  There are echoes of Animal Farm and the Cuban revolution, among others.  And there’s lots of bloody murder.  And a couple big twists.  We also learn more about what caused the fables to flee their lands and what their hopes for the future might be.  And I suspect at least one major villain may come from this story, though I don’t know what is to come.

    There are some very clever bits, and plenty of fun dereferences.  However, I can’t help but feel it’s all been done before.  The 10th Kingdom, a bunch of the urban fantasy that was so big in the 80s, etc.  And while the writing is pretty good and the art is pretty good, I was never wowed at all.  It’s all a bit obvious.  League of Extraordinary Gentlemen this isn’t.  I’ve heard it gets better later, but for right now, I think I’m good.

Fables: The Deluxe Edition: Volume 1
Author: Bill Willingham
Artists: Lan Medina, Mark Buckingham, etc.
Publisher: DC Comics
ISBN: 978-1-4012-2427-1

-Matt

Dork Art: NYCC Hasbro Exclusives!

Now this, on the other hand, makes me all kinds of happy.  Hasbro has scored artists Tom Whalen & Dave Perillo to whip up a couple of exclusive prints for the New York Comic Con.  Whalen gives us the Autobots & the Decepticons, while it's Perillo's hand representing the sunny disposition of the Joe/Cobra conflict.  Too cool for school.  All four prints will be available at the show running Oct 11-14th; the Whalens will set you back $50 a piece and the Perillos run $45.

--Brad

Book Review: The Strain

    Guillermo Del Toro’s films are a bit hit and miss for me, but there’s no denying he’s got some cool ideas.  I don’t know jack about Chuck Hogan.  Together, they’ve written a trilogy of novels about my least favorite monsters, vampires.  But, like the gross things from Blade 2, their vampires are monsters, not romantic figures who prey on emotionally crippled women.

    Connecting to old world myths, the second World War, and the sprawling history of New York City, the story feels very modern.  The anxiety of plague in a more connected world, the threat of bio-terrorism in a post 9/11 world, the scars on the psyche of New Yorkers.  It’s all very ‘now,’ even while having so much history.  A CDC agent, a Holocaust survivor, a pest control man, and a handful of others are witness to what may be the beginning of the end as a plague of blood-sucking, infectious beasts begin to spread through the city.

    There are some really cool twists on the vampire concept, though I think most of them have shown up in one way or another before.  But there are some good characters.  I especially like the exterminator, a classic New Yorker, willing to get his hands dirty, pitch in, and take a pipe to anyone or anything looking to mess with his city.  Unfortunately, the least interesting character is probably Eph, who is the main protagonist.  I never really cared about him or his family.  I am still curious to see where the series goes.

    I listened to the audio version of The Strain, which was read by the awesome Ron Perlman.  He’s good.  Does accents well, without sounding silly or showy.  You know who’s doing the talking without having to be told.

The Strain
Authors: Guillermo Del Toro & Chuck Hogan
Publisher: Harper Collins
ISBN: 978-0-06-171520-4

-Matt