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frank - up in grand blanc wrote:11/22/63, by Stephen King

Another other-worldly ramble filled with needless self-refencing and where the protagonist is (wait for it) an English teacher & writer living in (say it with me) Maine. The pretense is time-travel and a crusade for good, but the heart of the story is a doomed romance about which you will come to care and even cheer on. It's a fun read, but like most King's work you won't need to read it again.

We passed it around at work. Everyone liked it for what it was, though most of the Kennedy stuff is lost on me, and I'm not much for nostalgia. The romance was probably the best part. We also passed around Under the Dome. If you can ignore that anyone with a brain would have shot the sheriff on page two, and if you can forgive the retarded ending, it's a pretty good read. I kind of liked the dog part.

Green Eggs and Ham:

A childish book, where one of the characters, named Sam I Am (silly name, right) pesters an unnamed character into eating a thoroughly disgusting meal of Moldy eggs and ham. This unnamed character tries to explain to "Sam" that he won't eat this terrible meal in many places or in the company of many other disgusted creeps. It finally ends when Sam wins, and this character decides that he is better off eating it, than being pestered for the rest of his life. In the follow up book, this unnamed character has diarrhea because of this nasty meal.

Heywood McCrakin wrote:Green Eggs and Ham:

A childish book, where one of the characters, named Sam I Am (silly name, right) pesters an unnamed character into eating a thoroughly disgusting meal of Moldy eggs and ham. This unnamed character tries to explain to "Sam" that he won't eat this terrible meal in many places or in the company of many other disgusted creeps. It finally ends when Sam wins, and this character decides that he is better off eating it, than being pestered for the rest of his life. In the follow up book, this unnamed character has diarrhea because of this nasty meal.

Jesus Christ, Heywood, that's four.

I am so disappointed in you.

Don't get the idea that I'm actively contemplating and deconstructing 11/22/63, but it's been crossing my mind off and on since I finished it Tuesday night. But here's the deal: I've decided that the main storyline was, to anyone who's read at least a few King novels, as predictable as the sun rising each day. You know the formula.

First there's a long build-up where the reader is bludgeoned with the central character's bona fides... "I am a writer. I am easy-going and likeable in a way that 'squares' could never understand (e.g. I am Bill Clinton-cool). I'm a dork, but an interesting and sexual charged girl-next-door tears off her clothes shortly after meeting me. Etc." In other words, dorky Stephen King gets to right all of the insults of his own dorkiness by implementing his central character as an avatar. Hence bullies are bested, chicks put out, and the weird dude is actually the cool dude.

Next, we meet the monster, which in this case is a malevolent force determined to kill people and use all sorts of dirty tricks to stop do-gooders who want to spare the killees.

Then there's a Big Plan, where the protagonist and helpers hatch a cannot-miss tactical assault upon the monster. As always the plan is good. Water-tight, even. Of course it completely goes to shit, the good guys are sent scrambling, and at least one of the peripheral good guys must die. Central character gets beat up a bit, but he prevails and good kind of triumphs.


On the other hand, I really did enjoy the romance subplot. I don't read a lot (any?) romances, so I cannot say if any of this was original. However, after a while I realized that I was rooting for these two decent people to overcome the challenges to their friendship & then coupledom.

frank - up in grand blanc wrote:Don't get the idea that I'm actively contemplating and deconstructing 11/22/63, but it's been crossing my mind off and on since I finished it Tuesday night. But here's the deal: I've decided that the main storyline was, to anyone who's read at least a few King novels, as predictable as the sun rising each day. You know the formula.

First there's a long build-up where the reader is bludgeoned with the central character's bona fides... "I am a writer. I am easy-going and likeable in a way that 'squares' could never understand (e.g. I am Bill Clinton-cool). I'm a dork, but an interesting and sexual charged girl-next-door tears off her clothes shortly after meeting me. Etc." In other words, dorky Stephen King gets to right all of the insults of his own dorkiness by implementing his central character as an avatar. Hence bullies are bested, chicks put out, and the weird dude is actually the cool dude.

Next, we meet the monster, which in this case is a malevolent force determined to kill people and use all sorts of dirty tricks to stop do-gooders who want to spare the killees.

Then there's a Big Plan, where the protagonist and helpers hatch a cannot-miss tactical assault upon the monster. As always the plan is good. Water-tight, even. Of course it completely goes to shit, the good guys are sent scrambling, and at least one of the peripheral good guys must die. Central character gets beat up a bit, but he prevails and good kind of triumphs.


On the other hand, I really did enjoy the romance subplot. I don't read a lot (any?) romances, so I cannot say if any of this was original. However, after a while I realized that I was rooting for these two decent people to overcome the challenges to their friendship & then coupledom.

That was a helluva lot more than 3 sentences.

The Beav wrote:

frank - up in grand blanc wrote:Don't get the idea that I'm actively contemplating and deconstructing 11/22/63, but it's been crossing my mind off and on since I finished it Tuesday night. But here's the deal: I've decided that the main storyline was, to anyone who's read at least a few King novels, as predictable as the sun rising each day. You know the formula.

First there's a long build-up where the reader is bludgeoned with the central character's bona fides... "I am a writer. I am easy-going and likeable in a way that 'squares' could never understand (e.g. I am Bill Clinton-cool). I'm a dork, but an interesting and sexual charged girl-next-door tears off her clothes shortly after meeting me. Etc." In other words, dorky Stephen King gets to right all of the insults of his own dorkiness by implementing his central character as an avatar. Hence bullies are bested, chicks put out, and the weird dude is actually the cool dude.

Next, we meet the monster, which in this case is a malevolent force determined to kill people and use all sorts of dirty tricks to stop do-gooders who want to spare the killees.

Then there's a Big Plan, where the protagonist and helpers hatch a cannot-miss tactical assault upon the monster. As always the plan is good. Water-tight, even. Of course it completely goes to shit, the good guys are sent scrambling, and at least one of the peripheral good guys must die. Central character gets beat up a bit, but he prevails and good kind of triumphs.


On the other hand, I really did enjoy the romance subplot. I don't read a lot (any?) romances, so I cannot say if any of this was original. However, after a while I realized that I was rooting for these two decent people to overcome the challenges to their friendship & then coupledom.

That was a helluva lot more than 3 sentences.

Eh, he was dancing around the actual book, I guess. Hard to tell what really happened without spoiling it for somebody else. But for a three sentence review, here goes nothing. (non spoiler)

Schoolteacher goes back in time to 1958 to prevent the assassination of John F. Kennedy. In the years between the arrival and the assassination, he lives, loves, and gets the shit beat out of him. And, in the end, love conquers all, even an erased past.

I always heard that Ringworld was one of the pillars of sci-fi, but I am two-thirds through it, and it is fucking awful. It is a horribly written book. Third sentence: fuck this book.

Doctor Detroit wrote:I always heard that Ringworld was one of the pillars of sci-fi, but I am two-thirds through it, and it is fucking awful. It is a horribly written book. Third sentence: fuck this book.

10th grade science teacher gave me that book to read. It worked for me back then, but I doubt I could get through it today.

With the Old Breed, by E.B. Sledge

Adapted into the tour de force miniseries The Pacific, With the Old Breed told a nuanced story of youth coming of age in WWII via the absolute terror of war, bilateral racism, and descent into madness with a pleasing buddies story as both backdrop and release. In contrast the print version falls far short of the screen version by failing to actually present and follow, you know, actual characters, in a way that brings the reader into the story. Mr. Sledge, I salute your service as a combatarine in service to our country, but your damn written tale reads like a self-indulgent me-me-me post on a teenager's blog.

Detroit City is the Place to Be, Mark Binelli

Well not a review as much as a comment on how small our freakin' city is. On the first 100 pages they discussed: my old house, detroit bloggerjohn, Mark Covington, my dad's neighborhood (which was the same and the same time period as the authors dad), a former business partner, and something else I can't remember.

NYTimes loved it in thier book review, and it is an interesting read - but really, not much most of us can learn from reading a 3rd parties account of the city.

Saw Guitar Army by John Sinclair on the shelf at DPL and I borrowed it. It's a collection of his writings, an almost 300 page political manifesto, his Mein Kampf if you will, in which he outlines a three-pronged doctrine consisting of rock & roll, dope and fucking in the streets. When the people seize control and throw out the greedheads, everything will be free and we won't need money because, well, he's kind of short on details beyond saying that some pigs might have to be shot and he's up to the job but I've got about seventy pages left to slog through so maybe there's something still to unfold.

Struck out again. Almost done with the first book of Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" series. It should be called "Guys Sitting Around in Offices Talking About Boring Stuff."

Fifty Shades of Grey by E L James.

Last year, the book generated quite a buzz, so I downloaded the book to read on last year's vacation. I'd forgotten about the book until I'd heard Charlie Hunnam was cast as the lead and then left the movie. I can give it a three-word review: Worst. Book. Ever.

After hearing everyone rave about it, I figured it would be a little racy, but it would be a pretty good read. The book isn't worth the paper it's printed on. It's poorly written, the sex scenes are almost comical, and it's worse than one of those bodice-rippers you would see in a grocery store magazine/book section.

Shirley Jones' autobio

the Girl's (a) Superfreak!

Morty wrote:Shirley Jones' autobio

the Girl's (a) Superfreak!

I've got to read that; I've heard rumors about her for years.