Book Reviews.

Quickies again. I read more than this since the last time, but the hell if I can remember what they were.

The Keys to the Golden Firebird, by Maureen Johnson. Non-genre teen stuff is normally NOT MY THING. I mean, really NOT MY THING. I must now reconsider. I was too involved with this book to be jealous, even. I laughed, I cried, I'll read more of her stuff. Author's blog now listed under "mojo."

Ella Enchanted, by Gail Carson Levine; read by Eden Riegel. Audiobook. The way people adapt books to movies always interests me. Good job here, both on the book and the movie, in my opinion (the book is better). Again, will be reading more.

I started re-reading Terry Pratchett's Moving Pictures, forgot where I put the book down, and picked up The Fifth Elephant instead. While Terry Pratchett is always Terry Pratchett, there's a world of difference between these two books. In between MP (1990) and TFE (1999), something clicked: characters become engaging rather than purely funny; subplots fling back and forth and end up exactly where they should be (like the kind of folk dance he's always making fun of); the story has a meaning of its own that stands apart from satire. Hm...looking at his bibliography, I'd say the magic happened with the book right after MP, Reaper Man (1991). Hm...

Graphic Novels Are Books Too.

Promethea - Book 5, by Alan Moore et al. I read the rest of this series as the issues came out. It started out great! However, the plot devolved into enlightenment, and I left the series feeling saddened. But that's the way of it. If humanity craved enlightenment over plots, we'd all live in monastaries. Nevertheless, one of those things that needed to be done: a reminder to take a break from all the drama, step back for a moment, and realize life's not as serious as it looks. I think one way of talking about enlightenment is to say that life breaks the fourth wall. As does this series.

Batman: Detective No. 27, by Michael Uslan and Peter Snejbjerg (yes, I checked the spelling). On the one hand, great plot twist. On the other hand, this is supposed to be a mystery, dammit, and in mysteries, you have to play fair. (Life has no such requirements, so the revelation is at least plausible.) Decently done, if you don't like the mystery part of the whole detective thing. Waaaaaaaaaaaaaah!

Bigg Time: A Farcical Fable of Fleeting Fame, by Ty Templeton. This book must have had a really great pitch. A homeless guy, high on glue and shocked silly by the third rail in the NYC subway, suddenly sees his guardian angel, who hates him and has been screwing him over for most of his life. But...I hated the character. Granted, I wasn't supposed to like him, but...geh. Plot ending pretty predictable. Pretty fond of the art.

Lovecraft, by Hans Rodionoff, Enrique Breccia, and Keith Griffen. Magnificently ugly, twisted, and quintessentially human. I loved it. I cannot say enough good things about this book.