Heat Wave by Richard Castle

This is mostly just a test, a test to see if I can still post to this blog. It has been forever and there really are no excuses. I wanted to blame my eyes and old age but apparently that isn’t completely the case. Or at least the eye part isn’t the problem, so says the optometrist. So I’m going to blame old age and the brain rotting power of television on my inability to finish books.


Coincidentally, the first book I’ve been able to finish in 2010 is based on the television show Castle. If you are not a fan, let me explain it a little to you. Richard Castle is an author who has used his connections to tag along with New York’s finest detectives as research for his new novel. Here he finds Detective Kate Beckett as his new muse. Each week we get a new weird murder and Castle uses his talents to help the police solve crime. So this brings us to the actual book. Turns out, if someone writes a fictional book based on a book that was fictionally created in a fictional universe…. I MUST HAVE IT. I must buy it, no matter how it makes me hate myself, just a little bit.

The book runs just like the show. Murder, suspect, suspect, interrogation, murder, evidence, suspect, alibis, forensics, action, suspense, etc. All the things you need for a Who-Done-It. Especially one that reads just like it was written as a script for the show except they changed the character names. There are a few things here that you don’t get on tv, like a sex scene and the relationship that seems to have a chance in hell of actually happening in my lifetime. But then, it wouldn’t be tv if they didn’t drag that out as long as possible.

Ultimately, it is the best example ever of a guilty pleasure. Don’t like admitting that I’d read a book like this but it was fun and don’t regret it. I suspect only fans of the show would appreciate the novelty of the book and forgive it for coming off a little over-the-top. Tell me if I’m wrong. Otherwise it was just fun and if you are a fan of the show, you will likely find it was worth the price of admission.

‘Til next time.

Julie & Julia by Julie Powell

Yeah, I know it is has been forever since I’ve finished anything. I’m sure I feel worse about it than you do but I’m starting to accept the fact that the brain is turning to mush. I just can’t wait for the day when I won’t care.

Perhaps that is why Julie & Julia is a perfect book for summer mush brain. It is another blog turned book chronicling the Julie/Julia project. One unhappy woman, stuck in annoying temp job, decides to learn how to cook French food by working her way through Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol. 1. The real challenge: she will make all 524 recipes in one year. Every last one of them, even the aspics.

Aspics... I never thought I’d find anything more disgusting than calf brains as a culinary delight. The descriptions and the pain and horror Julie went through to complete that section of the cookbook set the bar pretty high. If you are like me and not an experienced French food connoisseur, aspic is where you take ingredients and place them into gelatin made out of meat stock. It’s jelly loaf. For some reason, it is the gelatin part I have a problem with. Why would you do that to perfectly good food? Jell-O should only be cherry flavoured and you should never add stuff to it (other than a dollop of whip cream if you are feeling fancy.) Now that I’ve got off my chest, after reading this book, I can respect the work that would go into a dish like that. If I should ever see one again, I won’t dismiss it out of hand and keep the shivers to a dull minimum.

I started the book about a couple weeks before the movie came out and was having problems getting through it but after seeing the movie this week, it helped encourage me to finish the last half. For the first time in the history of cinema, a movie actually compliments the book it was based on. The movie was great to give us more of Julia Child’s story, her life with Paul, her cooking, and her time in Paris. The book was great because it gave us more of Julie’s story, her life with Eric, her day job, her friends/family, and motivation on why would someone put themselves through something like this. You could read it as a post-September 11th look at New York and a piece of the emotional state of its citizens. Or if that is too deep for a summer read, one woman’s challenge to find her bliss brought on by impending dread of turning 30.

Personally, I’m really not a fan of cooking so I really shouldn’t even be reviewing this book. My general motto: can’t wait until all our nutritional requirements come in pill form. But I do like trying new food and restaurants so it has added to my appreciation in that sense.

Still staying away from aspics. Shiver.

Twilight by Stephanie Meyers

You’ll have to forgive me; it has been forever since I’ve written up a review of a book. But then, it has been awhile since I’ve read something I thought others might find even slightly interesting. Not that Twilight and the notion of interesting should be combined in the same sentence.

Basic story: girl moves to town to live with her father. Girl goes to school and she seems to be the best thing to hit town since the push-up bra ... She’s like catnip to all the boys. But there is one boy who doesn’t seem to like her at all and of course, he is the one she is most fascinated with. He’s different, his family is different, but she is not afraid of his otherworldly ways. He saves her life from an out-of-control car and thus begins the greatest teen romance of all time.

Sigh! I know that isn’t true. Romeo & Juliet was the greatest teen romance of all time. But there is something about this book that just makes me want to make outlandish statements and think I can get away with it. Granted, that notion is somewhat liberating but still, props to the master, Shakespeare. He knew teen angst like nobody’s business.

Twilight was so girly it freaked me out. Normally I like girly, it usually makes for good brain candy but warning: you will never get those brain cells back. I can forgive it for being girly. What I can’t forgive it for is being boring.

Once those two start having a relationship, it is as if the clock has stopped. I swear to god, there was a meadow scene where they were just sitting and it just went on and on and on. I have a friend that doesn’t like the shopping montage in movies, I personally hate the meadow scenes… I have no idea what they are supposed to represent. The spend forever getting to that damn meadow, you would have thought there would be something cool at the end of the journey… Nope, just vampire show and tell. We get to see Edward’s true nature and he has to be the most boring vampire ever put to print. He can kill grisly bears with his bare hands but we never get a sense of that fierceness. He has to be the safest bad-boy ever.

And Bella, I don’t know where to start with her. One, she is the most perfect teenage daughter of all time. She cooks, she cleans, she does the grocery shopping, and all the while maintaining top grades. If Stepford made children, they would be just like Bella. Two, her reaction to fear is non-reaction. Edward shouldn’t be mad about that, he should fear that his girlfriend has a neurological disorder. And three, she really needs to be less self-sacrificing. That death wish thing she has going on is very disturbing.

Ultimately, these books should not be read by anyone whose age is not ending in the word “teen”. As for everyone else, just don’t go there and pick up some Shakespeare instead.

Serenity, Vol. 2: "Better Days" by Joss Whedon & Brett Matthews, Illustrated by Will Conrad

I know, I know... I haven't posted a review in forever and I know for a fact that I read almost 30 books in 2008, thanks to my list in GoodReads. Surely some of them were worthy of the InCoHerEnt book review treatment. (And for the record, all books deserve some kind of book review.)

I'm just lazy.

But 2009 is a fresh start and I'm hopeful that I'll get back into the groove. Not sure if this is the right book to get me there.

I can never resist a graphic novel by Joss Whedon. No matter what it is, I must have. I think it comes from missing his television shows so much. This one was like getting a lost episode from the archive that was never filmed but just story boarded. This volume takes three Serenity comics and binds them together to form the Better Days story arc. The basic story: the gang is hired do a heist, they heist, they deliver, but the guy can't pay. He pays them with information on how to find a stash of currency, they find it and there is a lot of it. Now they have someone even bigger chasing after them.

In a lot of ways, this one reminded me of one of my favourite Firefly episodes, "Ariel", and the fall-out in the episode "War Stories". Because of that, I didn't find this turn really gave us anything new. It pokes at the mysteries that I sometimes feel will never be answered. My other problem was that it takes place before the Serenity movie. It was nice seeing Wash and Shepherd again but I want to know what is going on with characters since the movie. It didn't feel like a progression of the story arc, just a retread of old material. It was an okay story, with some laugh-out-loud dialogue, but I didn't have a wow moment.

It would be remiss not to mention the artist, Will Conrad. He's very good at recreating the facial features of our beloved actors who he got spot on, especially the guys. Giving him the benefit of the doubt, the women might have been harder to render with their softer features. Anyway, I was less annoyed here than I normally am with comics where I can compare the art to an actor's face.

So, I can only recommend this to the die-hard Firefly/Serenity fans who are looking for anything new to add to their encyclopedic knowledge of the series. Otherwise, you might be a little disappointed.

American Gods by Neil Gaiman

Oh, the pain.

I love Neil. I positively, truly do. But I had the hardest time getting through this book and I don't really blame Neil for it. I suspect I am just getting stupider in my old age.

American Gods is a nice hefty little book that chronicles the adventures of a man named Shadow. He gets out of prison a week early to attend the funeral of his dear departed wife. On the way there, a man with a job offer approaches Shadow and he will not take no for an answer. He needs someone to do errands for him, chauffeur him around when needed, odd jobs. It turns out that he is one of the old gods and he has taken it upon himself to rally all the other old gods to do battle with the new American gods. The old gods are the ones that were brought over from the old country with the immigrants. The new gods are the ones that are worshipped today: television, media, internet, etc. Just like any war, everyone thinks their side is right and it gets pretty nasty.

For the record, I really did like the book. It had a nice sense of surreal to it and you never really knew what to expect even though some plot points were a little unsurprising. In some ways, it reminded me of Gaiman's Sandman series and it made me miss those old comics. My only problem was that I didn't feel the compulsion to keep picking it up to find out what was going to happen next. I always enjoyed it when I did but didn't feel all that guilty when I took a break to read a different book, which happened twice. That could have been the real reason it seemed to take me so long to finish it. If you like mythology at all, you really should read it.

That is all I have to say.

Lady Oracle by Margaret Atwood

Review by Red Bonney

Margaret Atwood is a Goddess of Canadian Literature. She should be revered so. Despite these frank and somewhat obsequious adulations, I am not employed in the Margaret Atwood fanclub (but I would if they’d hire me).

This book struck me almost immediately as a great novel. I picked it up at the bookstore because I have an addiction to buying books and the bookcover and title attracted my eye that particular day. For a long time, it sat on my shelf because that’s what happens to the majority of books I buy on impulse. When I finally got around to cracking the cover to read the thing, I couldn’t believe that it had been written when I was two(-ish). It is the mark of a readable (and re-readable) book that can be read in any era without immediately being reminded of ghastly orange plaid slacks. What I am trying to say is, the characters were like real people, the places are real places and the plot is as exciting and mundane as real life.

The story opens with the heroine, Joan Foster, a famous and easily identifiable personage, hiding in a small village in Italy. She has just completed a stunt wherein she left Canada and her husband believing that she had died in a boating accident. Naturally the reader is left to think up all kinds of nasty rumour and innuendo about this husband. Why did she leave him in so dramatic a method? What did he do to deserve such treatment? What sort of shenanigans did she get up to that she thought this was a good and proper solution to her problems?

None of these questions are answered until much further on in the book. Because next, we go on a history lesson of Joan’s childhood, as traumatic and disastrous as anyone can claim. Her parents, though they (eventually) live in the same house, were essentially estranged. And strange. Her mother was a controlling perfectionist and forever complaining about Joan to Joan; her father was somewhat detached from the world and his family; and neither parent did much to make life any easier for their only daughter.

The story winds along with snippets of ‘present day’ Joan added in, in which she is trying to write a novel in order to make some money to facilitate her new life as Someone Else, and eventually meets up with this present day (which is actually some time in the late sixties or early seventies I think). It was like reading three books at once: The Past life of Joan, where she is an overweight, awkward kid trying to fit herself into the world that seems to want nothing to do with her. The Present Joan, a fugitive on the run pretending to be her other persona in order to fix whatever went wrong. And the novel inside the novel. Joan’s novel was mirroring her own experiences. She had to find the correct ending to her own story in order to finish the book. But then, life happens and everything goes wrong. Again.

Such is life.

Bloodletting & Miraculous Cures by Vincent Lam

Stupid dog. I'm sitting on my mother's front porch watching a neighbour's dog tempt fate by running back and forth across the street, narrowly avoiding oncoming traffic and its owner who keeps yelling, "Buddy!" Apparently this is a common occurrence and I'm finding it way too stressful. More on that later.

So, I finished another book. Weird how I feel more productive the more books I read and this one was a Giller prize winner. Not one of my pulp or graphic novels I can get through in a day. That being said it wasn't a difficult read or boring or weird in a Canadian literature sort of way. Weird, eh?

This book is a compilation of short stories about the medical experience, told from the point of view of a half a dozen doctors, starting from pre-med and the pressure to get into med school to the frustrations of the job. Since the author is also a doctor, I was a little afraid that the characters would be portrayed more on the heroic or martyred end of the spectrum like you find on bad television medical melodrama. That wasn't the case. Some of the doctors are jerks and some not-so-much of a jerk, basically human.

The fun part was finding out stuff I had noticed before, thought was weird, and now have an explanation for it. As in, I've spotted doctors coming in the patient's room during their rounds and take a seat. Are they tired? Didn't get enough sleep the night before? Turns out this gives the patient a sense of time spent and it is taught early. Unfortunately, I just know that if I find myself in a hospital and the doc takes a seat at the edge of the bed or nearby chair, I'll get a little giggly and that will earn me an extra day's stay for a psych evaluation. And to be honest, that just sounds easier than trying to explain what is going on it my wacky head.

Another interesting point, they put a glossary of terms in the back of the book but there wasn't a time when I thought that I didn't understand something. Must be a sure sign that I've watched way too much tv.

Anyway, this was a good book. Glad I read it, even if things didn't roll where I would have wanted them to.

As for the dog, the poor thing has been captured after about an hour of playing chase in the neighbourhood; score another point for that dog's guardian angel. I was sure a couple squealed tire sounds was going to mean that it was a goner for sure.

Fool Moon: Book Two of the Dresden Files by Jim Butcher

Oh how I love reading on my vacation. If you spend a Sunday reading, you don’t feel bad about ignoring all the things you should be doing before the start of the week. Not that that has prevented me from Sunday reading in the past but you know...

Fool Moon is the second book from Jim Butcher’s Dresden Files series of books. I read book one ages ago and did a review of it on the podcast. At the time, we also reviewed the show that can currently be found on your local sci-fi channel. Love the show and sometimes get taken back a bit by the differences in the two. I love the ghost like character, Bob, who is played by an actor you can see. Whereas in the book, he is a disembodied voice who lives in a skull on Dresden’s shelf and only comes out when Harry wants recipes for fun little potions or info on things like werewolves. Thankfully, television being a visual medium, they made him slightly more corporeal with a body we can see and with slightly more impact on the plot.

In Fool’s Moon, werewolves are afoot and in this little world, we don’t just have one set design for the wolves. That has to be the strongest selling point for the book. Typically, an author will take a look at past werewolf legends, pick a few characteristics they like, mix together and viola! They have their own creative spin on the monster legend. Butcher takes the time to incorporate four or five different types into his story and this allows for some interesting plot twists. Some are turned when they wear a magical belt, some turn when they chant some magic, some are cursed, etc.

Also, I noticed a big jump in writing quality when it came to this book in comparison to the first book in the series. The first one, the plot was so painfully obvious but he had created an interesting enough world that it made you want to keep reading. Here, you weren’t quite sure where it was going to go and he set up Dresden with enough obstacles that you couldn’t be sure if he could make it out alive. Granted, there are at least four more books in the series so I wasn’t all that worried but if the story is good enough, you can find yourself forgetting that little bit of info for awhile.

So, I’ll continue to read these books. They are fun and a nice break from reality every once in awhile.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling

It is over. Over. Never to be anymore. Gone.

So it is 2:30AM and my only source of comfort is leftover Naan bread from this evening’s takeaway. Why don't I have any friends that would be up at this hour? I know lots of techie people and yet, not one I can call at this late hour to lament on the ending of Harry Potter.

But don't get me wrong. I’m not upset about what happened; it sort of unfolded like I expected. A few turns, along the way I didn't expect but great nonetheless. I laughed, I cried, I made it last six days and that is pretty good considering the pressure I've been receiving from work to finish the blasted thing. Not to mention, one guy who kept teasing me by pretending to give away the ending.

Now comes the post-mortem. I need to go out and read the spoilers and the analyzing webpages and the Rowling interviews to see if she gives anything away. Anything that reveals why she made the choices she did. Why kill one character over another? Who did she spare that she wasn't intending to? These are burning questions I need to know. The most amazing thing she accomplished with this book is the tying up of loose strings. If she never got around to publishing that gigantic omnibus of Harry Potter lore, I will be okay with that.

Anyway, it has been a fantastic ride and I wouldn’t change any of it. Jo has given us a brilliant story and I hope to see more from her in the future, even if it is under another name.

Something Borrowed and Something Blue by Emily Giffin

This is a double review. Something Borrowed is one book and Something Blue is the second and both by the same author. I borrowed both from a friend at work and read them both back to back. Seemed silly to do two reviews when they are both so intertwined.

Something Borrowed, the first book, tells the story of Rachel, a lawyer in New York who discovers she is in love with her best friend’s fiancé. Rachel is the type who is smart, bookish, and has always played by the rules. In a lot of ways, she has always played second fiddle to her best friend Darcy who is beautiful and has always had guys falling over themselves to be with her. So she finds her world turned upside down when on the night of her 30th birthday party, she starts having an affair with Dex. Dex is a fellow lawyer, they went to school together and she was the one to introduce Dex to Darcy. The big question becomes, does she follow her heart and risk losing her oldest friend in the process? It is a bit more complicated than that.

Something Blue, the other book, tells the story of Darcy, a PR Rep who has just had to cancel her wedding to Dex and finds out that she is pregnant with another man’s baby. Yep, not only was Rachel and Dex having an affrair but Darcy and Marcus, Dex’s college roommate and groomsman from the ill-fated wedding, were getting a little on the side as well. Darcy has always traded on her looks to get what she wants and can’t understand how her world has been turned upside down by finding herself alone for the first time ever and with a baby on the way. She decides to travel to London and move in with an old childhood friend to get her life back on track. But what she valued in the past doesn’t seem to be working for her anymore. Is it possible for her to make a change or will she fall back on old patterns that focused on image and material things over substance?

Personally, I found Something Blue more interesting to read over Something Borrowed. Something Borrowed was more about fretting about what was going on than anything actually going on. And to be honest, when Rachel goes to London to visit Ethan, I didn’t really understand why she didn’t stay and hook up with him. He was the most appealing male character in the series and was glad to see him return for a second time around. Darcy, as a character, was a little more fascinating to read as I had so little in common with her.

As fluff books go, it wasn’t the best I’ve ever read but still fun.