Let's Pretend This Never Happened

Let's Pretend This Never Happened (a mostly true memoir) by Jenny Lawson  318 pp.

Read this book! It's laugh out loud funny in that taxidermied animal, squirrel hand puppet, anxiety attack, dog mauling, couch etiquette, alligator pirate, argue with your spouse sort of way. In other words, if you have a quirky sense of humor you will meet your match in blogger, Jenny Lawson. I haven't laughed so hard reading a book in a long time.

Einstein's Dreams

Einstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman 140 pp

This book is a fictional series of dreams about the bending of time. They are dreams that the patent clerk, Albert Einstein may have had while developing his theory of relativity. In the "dreams" time is circular or runs backwards, slows down, and sometimes stops. Each dream has a deeper meaning about life and how we choose to live it. It's a thought provoking book.

Batman: Earth One/Geoff Johns

Batman:  Earth One by Geoff Johns (story) and Gary Frank (art); graphic novel; 144 pages

Earth One retools both Batman's origin story and his "year one" into something much darker than what we've come to know as cannon. Bruce Wayne here is a spoiled, self-absorbed child whose temper tantrum results in his parents' death; Alfred is a grizzled war veteran who specializes in personal security, and trains a teenage Bruce in how to fight a war; and Bruce himself--well, he starts out as the noble, idealistic hero we all know, but one of the first things he learns is how to be cruel and cunning, and not always fight fair.  It's an interesting take on the Dark Knight, but I found myself really enjoying it.  Johns changes enough to make a familiar story fresh and exciting, and Frank's art is a perfect fit for the dark, brooding story.  This isn't Batman for the whole family--with serial killers, guns, and more, it's definitely better for mature fans who are looking for something a little darker, but not as heavy-handed as, say, Frank Miller.  

Red Robin: The Hit List/Fabain Ncienza

Red Robin:  The Hit List by Fabian Ncieza (Red Robin 3); graphic novel; 128 pages

In the third Red Robin collection,Tim Drake is setting up shop as an independent crime fighter in Gotham.  He has a lot to figure out:  where to live, who his allies will be, and who to fight.  For the latter, he makes the titular hit list, a set of plans designed to set up a new villain's capture for each one Red Robin brings down. 

I'm still really enjoying this character, and was sad to learn that (a) there's only one more collection after this, and (b) it came out only a few months ago, so it's not eligible for ILL.  :(

This book sets up Red Robin as a proper superhero, not just a temporary persona for Tim to use while searching for Bruce Wayne.  He even starts to accumulate some bad guys of his own, including Anarky (a new one), and the mysterious Lynx (who, as Tim points out, has the potential to become his very own Catwoman).  I also had a lot of fun with the interactions between the Wayne family members--Bruce, Tim, Dick, and Damian. 

Batman: Knightfall, vol 3

Batman:  Knightfall volume 3:  Knightsend by a whole bunch of various authors and artists; graphic novel; 652 pages

In the conclusion to the Knightfall epic, Bruce Wayne returns to Gotham, but must relearn much of that martial arts skills and physical agility he lost when Bane injured him.  Following a grueling physical training program with the notorious Lady Shiva, Bruce must fight to reclaim the mantle of the Bat and the role as protector of Gotham from the now-insane Azrael.

This book was a good change from the previous volume, which contained a whole lot of Jean-Paul Crazy.  In this volume, we move back and forth between Bruce, Azrael/Batman, and Robin & Nightwing, who are working as a support unit to Batman.  The inevitable defeat of Jean-Paul comes in the middle of the book, with the second half devoted to the aftermath of Jean-Paul's actions.  Another interesting arc was the final twelve issues collected here:  the Prodigal storyline, in which Bruce, having just reclaimed his role as Batman, inexplicably abandons it for several months, and leaves Dick Grayson to fill in.  Reading this next to the more modern Batman stories (in which Bruce Wayne is presumed dead, and Grayson once again must take on the role of Batman) is really surreal:  Grayson expresses similar complaints and fears in each instance, but in the Morrison arcs seems to be having those thoughts for the first time, so that was weird.  Was there a reboot somewhere between 1994 and 2008 that I'm unaware of?  Leaving aside the strange and unexplained disappearance of Bruce Wayne for the latter half of the book, this is a satisfying conclusion to the story, though once again I found myself wondering what was left out of this collection.

A final note on the art:  there's a lot of different artists involved here, so it's hard to make blanket statements about anything (except Nightwing's mullet, which is consistently hilarious).  However, if you were to just look at the cover, you'd never know there was actual good art inside.  I understand choosing an image of Batman and Azrael facing off as the cover of the collection (this is also the cover of the issue in which they clash), but surely we could have picked something that uses proper perspective, and that doesn't look like Azrael is about to crack is spine.  I'm not even sure what Batman is doing there--a bizarre dance of some kind? 

TL;DR:  I'm glad I read this classic story, but it's not something I'd recommend to the casual comics fan, or even the beginner comics reader.  Getting through this takes some dedication.  

Homer and Langley

Homer and Langley by E.L. Doctorow  208 pp.

Homer and Langley Collyer were real people. In 1947 the eccentric brothers were found dead in their N.Y. mansion filled with old newspapers and the other detritus of their bizarre habits. Doctorow created a fictionalized version of the story narrated by Homer, the brother who loses his eyesight as a teenager. Langley goes off to fight in WWI and is severely injured by mustard gas. He returns home changed both physically and mentally to find his brother living alone in their Fifth Avenue mansion with the servants. Their parents died during the Spanish flu epidemic. Their home becomes a haven for tea dances, Langley's cockeyed projects, musicians, gangsters, hippies, a Model T in the dining room, and others who wander through the lives of the brothers. Fights with the health department, utility companies, and banks cause an increased sense of paranoia in the brothers who end up shuttering their house and booby trapping it to stop unwanted invaders. Doctorow takes liberties with the story by having the brothers live long past 1947. Their lives in the story are marked by the succession of wars up through Vietnam. Who knows what made the real Collyer brothers live like they did? Doctorow's speculation makes for a good story.

Thy Neighbor

They Neighbor by Norah Vincent 306 pgs.

If you like books full of characters that are all creepy, this might be for you.  Nick Walsh is thirty-four and an alcoholic basket case.  His parents met a violent end which was the final blow to a less than stellar upbringing.  This, of course, is  his excuse to be one of the neighborhood weirdo who spends his few sober moments spying on his neighbors and being a jack-ass.  Clearly not a real sympathetic character but pretty much everyone else in this book is as bad or worse.

I loved the Norah Vincent's 2 non-fiction books that precede this one but this dark tale is not my cup of tea.  Not to say that it wouldn't be yours but overall a little too depressing for me.

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The Alloy of Law/Brandon Sanderson

The Alloy of Law by Brandon Sanderson (Mistborn book 4-ish); fantasy, steampunk; 336 pages (about 10 hours on audio)

Hundreds of years have passed since the events of The Hero of Ages; the world is no longer choked with ash or oppressed by brutal rulers--indeed, it has begun to move into its own industrial era, with railroads and skyscrapers bringing civilization to the wild lands beyond the city.  Lord Waxilium Ladrian has been exiled to the Roughs by his family, and has made a life for himself as a lawkeeper; when a sudden death draws him back to the city, he thinks his days of investigation are over.  But soon a band of criminals begins to terrorize the city, kidnapping women from noble houses and stealing small fortunes in metals from railcars.  When the woman he's engaged to marry is stolen, Wax starts to investigate on his own.

A lot of reviews I've read refer to this book as Mistborn-lite.  I can see why:  the plot here is much simpler and less introspective than those of previous Mistborn books, and new setting is so radically different from the ash-covered world of before that it does feel like a different series.  Allomancy  and Feruchemy (two of the major abilities available to mankind) are still around, but in radically different forms as well.  In fact, one of the most interesting parts of this book was seeing how those powers have changed with the advent of industrialization (steel-pushing and guns?  I'm there). 

Despite all the changes, I had a lot of fun with this book.  It was fun to see how the legends of Vin, Eland, Sazed, and all the rest have been interpreted and changed over the years.  It was also kind of nice to have a little more action and a little less philosophy in this volume.  The ending was a little predictable, but Sanderson throws in a great twist in the epilogue that makes me see a series in this book's future.  Mistborn meets steampunk:  it totally works, and I will happily read more of these. 

Monkey Mind

Monkey Mind: A Memoir of Anxiety by Daniel B. Smith  212 pp.

Daniel Smith's life was almost paralyzed by anxiety. The simple act of choosing condiments for a sandwich could immobilize him with dread. Anxiety was a torment from childhood on. It ruined relationships, nearly ended his college education, and caused him to quit jobs. In this book he chronicles his experiences and various forms of treatment he received from doctors and therapists until he finally finds one that helps more than the others. Smith writes about his experiences with honesty and humor. Some of the more technical parts get a little dry but overall it's an interesting book.

A hundred flowers, by Gail Tsukiyama

In 1956, Mao Tse-Tung wrote, “Let a hundred flowers bloom; let a hundred schools of thought contend,” thus inviting intellectuals to offer their ideas about and critiques of the Communist Party.  Those who did fell into a trap and soon found themselves being “reeducated” in far-off labor camps.  This is why seven-year-old Tao’s father Sheng has disappeared.  Tao lives with his mother, Kai Ying, scholarly grandfather, Wei, Auntie (in name only) Song, and another couple in the subdivided villa which had been his family’s ancestral home.  This gentle tale covers a short period in the family’s story when Tao falls from a tree and breaks his leg; a homeless, pregnant girl shows up on their doorstep; and grandfather Wei, holding a terrible secret, sets off alone on a 1,000 mile journey to find his son.  I enjoyed the book, but found it episodic and ultimately wondered why the author had written it.  Not one of her best.  288 pp.