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Captain America: Winter Soldier
Captain America: Winter Soldier by Ed Brubaker Format: Trade Paperback Illustrated by: Steve Epting / Mike Perkins / Michael Lark Collects: Captain America (vol. 5) #1-9 & 11-14 Publisher: Marvel Comics Published: 2005 (collected in 2010) Length: 304 pages Growing up, I was not the least bit interested in Captain America. I think he always seemed a bit tacky to Canadian readers. We have had a couple of maple leaf clad heroes, one with the embarrassing name of Captain Canuck, but they never really took off. I think by the time I was reading comics, the whole squeaky-clean patriotic leader idea wasn’t really in style. Once I learned a bit…
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Off to Be the Wizard
Off to Be the Wizard by Scott Meyer Published: 2014 Series: Magic 2.0 #1 Narrated by: Luke Daniels Length: 10:15 (372 pages) This has been on my Audible recommended list for quite a while. I happily judge books by their covers when browsing for something to read, and I have to admit, as a life-long lover of video games, I was suckered in by this cover. It’s almost unfair, really. This was written by Scott Meyer, who has a web comic I was unaware of called Basic Instructions. This is about an unhappy programmer named Martin Banks who, out of boredom, spends time digging through random files on random file…
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Delilah Dirk and the King’s Shilling
Delilah Dirk and the King’s Shilling by Tony Cliff Format: Original Graphic Novel Illustrated by: Tony Cliff Series: Delilah Dirk #2 Publisher: First Second Published: 2016 Length: 272 pages After I finished the first Delilah Dirk book, I noticed there was a second volume that had just been released. That’s the pleasure of being a few years behind the ball, I suppose. I picked it up at a local comic store soon after, and was pleased to find that it was twice the size of the first. The first book focused more on the story of Selim, the Turkish Lieutenant, while keeping Delilah a super-powered mystery. In this book, we…
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A Prayer for Owen Meany
A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving Published: 1989 Length: 617 pages This is the story of two young friends, beginning from their childhood as schoolboys in a New Hampshire classroom and continuing through their adolescence and into adulthood. John Wheelwright, the narrator, is from a wealthy and respected family. He is a surprisingly ordinary and passive character, at least in his younger years, but serves well as a lens from which to view Owen Meany. Owen is a physically underdeveloped but deeply intelligent boy with an unchanged high voice, like one stuck in a permanent scream (and written IN ALL CAPS like Pratchett’s Death). He is from a…
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September in Review
Books Acquired: The Death of Bunny Munro by Nick Cave I Was the Cat by Paul Tobin Kaijumax, Season 1 by Zander Cannon The Sixth Gun, Vol. 1: Cold Dead Fingers by Cullen Bunn Something to Remember You By by Gene Wilder Fool’s Quest by Robin Hobb Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader by Anne Fadiman Authority by Jeff VanderMeer The Vegetarian by Han Kang The Bookman’s Tale by Charlie Lovett If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino French Milk by Lucy Knisley Facing Unpleasant Facts: Narrative Essays by George Orwell On Writing by Charles Bukowski Ballistics: Poems by Billy Collins Laughter in the Dark by…
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The Sea
The Sea by John Banville Published: 2005 Narrated by: John Lee Length: 06:54 (200 pages) Max Morden is a middle-aged man who has just recently lost his wife to illness, and in his grief has returned to the Irish seaside town where his family used to holiday in his youth. During his time there reflecting on his relationship with his wife, and those awkward final days, his mind goes back to his first childhood relationship that took place in that town many years ago. This is a beautifully written novel, and I do enjoy a despicable and depressed protagonist, so the combination of the rich descriptions, morose attitude, and nasty…
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Double Cup Love
Double Cup Love by Eddie Huang Published: 2016 Narrated by: Eddie Huang Length: 05:48 (240 pages) I really enjoyed parts of Eddie’s first book, Fresh Off the Boat, but it annoyed me quite a bit in places as well. He’s a gifted writer when he’s writing about food, and he has some great insights into culture identity and self-discovery, but I really lost interest when he started bragging about his rebellious youth. His early life story was interesting, but I just couldn’t stand the way he decided to tell it. This was much more up my alley. After the success of his first book, the restaurant, and the various food…
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We Stand On Guard
We Stand On Guard by Brian K. Vaughan Format: Deluxe Edition Hardcover Illustrated by: Steve Skroce, Matt Hollingsworth Series: We Stand On Guard #1-6 Publisher: Image Comics Published: 2015 Length: 160 pages Brian K. Vaughan, author of many loved comics, including Saga, tackles the often joked about idea of the US invading Canada in this six issue limited series. Vaughan lives in Canada with his Canadian wife, but was born and raised in Cleveland, so even though Americans do get painted as the baddies in this, it is one of your own doing it at least. It’s the year 2124, and major droughts have left the Americans without water, which…
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Holiday Book Haul
Lee-Ann and I just returned from a week and a half in Seattle and Portland. We started in Seattle, which is just a couple of hours on a ferry for us, and spent the weekend attending Pax West, a huge video game conference. We met up with some friends we haven’t seen in ages, and it was a great weekend. Afterwards we took the train to Portland. We wanted to see the city, but I’d be lying if I said Powell’s Books wasn’t a big draw. We had a fantastic week, full of good food and city wandering, and we bought an awful lot of books. I’ll go more into…
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Bedecked
This was Billy Collins’ choice in Poems That Make Grown Men Cry, and I thought it was fantastic. I really love Redel’s anger and the acceptance she has for her son. Allowing a girl to grow up a tomboy may be acceptable now, but turning the tables on that does take some courage. Bedecked by Victoria Redel Tell me it’s wrong the scarlet nails my son sports or the toy store rings he clusters four jewels to each finger. He’s bedecked. I see the other mothers looking at the star choker, the rhinestone strand he fastens over a sock. Sometimes I help him find sparkle clip-ons when he says sticker earrings…