Book Review: Williwaw

At the age of 19, I was finally taking the actual in-car driving test for my license just before my sophomore year of college. When Gore Vidal was nineteen, he served as a first mate of a U.S. Army freight ship in the Aleutian Islands and writing his first novel, Williwaw.

The novel tells of an Army vessel transporting a few officers across the Arctic Sea. With snow and cold winds howling along the passage and flaring tensions between crewmen who've been in close quarters far too long, the ship attempts to make the Big Harbor of the Aleutians in a few days time. Until a strong Arctic with -- a williwaw in the native language -- swoops down from the mountains, relentlessly pounding the ship, its crew and passengers to the breaking point.

A great story filled with vividly drawn, tense characters, pointing out the distinctions of those military men constantly in the thick of action compared to those sitting behind desks deciding which base to close or what troops to send where. It also proves to be very satisfying for those of us who enjoy a good man vs. nature story. But Vidal takes the tale one step further, adding a crewman's death under mysterious circumstances at one point during the storm, that moves the story into the realm of human nature. How much can a person endure before cracking - both physically because of the relentless wind and mentally because of a mutual dislike of one another? How does the crew handle the death and the aftermath?

Not exactly what I would expect from the mind of a 19 year old

Williwaw is a surprising debut novel from one of the masters of fiction. HIghly recommended.

Backlog of Books

We returned from our play date with our friend's twins on Saturday afternoon, and sitting atop the mailbox was a thick hard envelope from St. Martin's Press with another book for me to read and review. This time, it's The Birthing House from Christopher Ransom -- yet another spooky haunted house novel. (The folks at St. Martin's really seem to know what I like.) I started reading it last night and am slowly getting into it. Yet, I can't help but feel guilty about all the books I've recently finished and haven't found the time to write my reviews. So I'll knock those out of the way beginning tonight so I can be all fresh and guilt-free for this new tale of terror.

Image from The eBook Store from Sony.

Don't Feed the Plants

A few weeks ago, I casually asked my Brother if he and his wife would like to join us for a little theater outing. To my surprise, he said yes. (I expect his wife pointedly nudged him into that answer.) So last night, the two of them joined us for a quick dinner at CPK which, for some reason, had its ups and downs: the "ups" being dinner with my Brother and his wife as we don't manage it often enough; the "downs" being how Caesar spilled half a glass of red Zinfandel on his light blue shirt.

A glass of soda water and some bbq chicken pizza slices later, and all was good with the world.

From there, we headed to the Carpenter Center and the opening night of Little Shop of Horrors, a jaunty little gem about a man-eating plant that manipulates a meek little guy into helping him take over Skid Row and the world. I've seen both versions of the movie (love Roger Corman's classic) but never the live stage musical, and I thought it would be a fun time for us all. Which is was. The music was fantastic, catchy '50s flavors with very witty lyrics. The sets were from the National Tour as were the puppets for Audrey II, the man-eating plant. (Amazing how they made the plant seem so realistic, and what a great voice from Michael A . Shepperd.) The actors did a fine job: Stuart Pankin as Mr. Mushnik; Peter Paige as Orin Scrivello DDS (along with almost every other character); Lowe Taylor awed everyone as Audrey; and Danny Gurwin played a wonderfully meek Seymour Krelborn. And not to forget Meloney Collins, Kamlah Marshall and Fredericka Meek as Ronette, Crystal and Chiffon -- kind of like the Greek chorus as a '50s girl group. We enjoyed the show -- my Brother even said so! -- and I'm thinking this opened the door to possible more shows with the four of us in the future.

Book Review: IM

A serial killer has been making the rounds of Chicago, using a gay hook-up site to find his victims, and openly gay police office Ed Comparetto is called in to investigate. Things start to go wrong when the claim of a false witness statement forces Comparetto to reluctantly turn in his badge. To clear his name and possibly to get his job back, Comparetto starts his own investigation into the grisly murders, wondering just who that mysterious witness was and what he has to do with the growing number of murders.

A promising idea for a story from author Rick R. Reed, but something just didn't click for me. All the characters seemed to overact, coming across as overly melodramatic, and I never found myself caring for any of them. Many times the characters even came across as clichéd: the gay cop who's booted from the force for being open with his sexuality and determined to find the killer to get his good name back; the self-loathing serial killer who (surprise) turns out to be gay. And for a former police officer, Comparetto has a knack for not assessing a situation before jumping in, and I found it difficult to believe that he had been good at his job.

Some of the scenes, though, were very vivid and well-drawn, such as one of the killer's flashbacks concerning what drove him to kill. Effective and creepy, my skin crawled as I read it. I also liked the victim vignettes, giving a glimpse into the different personalities who use the hook-up site -- everyday men, looking for different ideas of love or a good time. And the little twist with the twins just added another good creep factor to a sometimes predictable story.

Little Wall-E

It started with the Beautician Bot, the pink one near the center of the picture. When we walked into the comic book store, the squat vending machine with its imprisoned mini plastic figures beckoned to me. I glanced at the Hello Kitty baubles and the Pokémon creatures, but stopped, my eyes growing wider with giddy excitement at the next compartment. Crammed into tiny plastic eggs were mini robots from the movie Wall-E, and I knew. I needed to have them.

I cashed in a dollar bill for quarters, dropped them into the slot and spun the crank. The eggs jostled. A metallic thump at the tiny door. I peeled away the tape surrounding my egg and brought forth the tiny Beautician Bot. A few weeks passed until we returned. Again, I dropped in my quarters and out popped another egg, this time with Mow Mow. And then, this past Friday when we entered the store, I noticed the Wall-E figures were gone from their compartment, replaced with Spderman and his gang. I almost said something to the clerk until I discovered a box near the base of the vending machine with 50¢ scrawled in large red letters along the front. Inside were dozens of the plastic eggs, many of them with a Wall-E paper showing through the plastic. I dove in, sorting through the eggs, unable to open them to make sure I didn't already have that particular bot. I'm sure the clerk thought I was crazy, a grown many tossing plastic eggs from a box. It didn't matter. I wanted those six remaining figures. And somehow, without being able to verify the contents of each egg, I managed to obtain all the figures without duplicates.

The picture shows them in all their glory, combined to form a scene from the movie.

(Okay, so I'm a little bit nuts when it comes to Disney.)

The Long Weekend...In Short

I feel as though I haven't been paying my blog the attention I used to. My life hasn't seemed interesting enough lately to write a post. I'm a bit hooked on Twitter these days, as well as spending much of my free time reading novels (and playing Nintendo DS when not watching Ghost Adventures) and writing reviews of said books.

With that said, Caesar and I did enjoy a nice, relaxing, three-day weekend.

Friday I woke at 8 AM (which is sleeping in for me), contemplated dragging my lazy butt form bed to walk at the beach (per doctor's orders), but lingered in bed reading instead. Caesar woke up an hour or so later, and we decided to run a few errands before the big birthday party in the evening. So we hopped in the car, making our way to our favorite little indie comic book store. Cruising North on the 605, we noticed too late a swirling mass of pigeons diving in and out of traffic of the fastlane. One swooped toward the windshield, and I hoped it would get sucked into the upwind and be swept safely over the car. However, the smudge from the brief thwack has yet to be cleaned from the windshield. We finally reached the comic store without any further avian hazards, and Caesar searched for the latest issue of Buffy the Vampire Slayer while I rifled through a box at the front the store with plastic eggs containing tiny figures. I found the remaining six mini plastic Wall-E figures to complete my set, with the picture being posted tomorrow in all its splendor. I also purchased the final issue of Locke & Key: Head Games. Caesar shook his head as I opened each egg in the car and attached the figures to their bases.

Later in the evening, we headed for a birthday party in Koreatown at a small Korean BBQ called Gui Rim. Imagine 20 people, crammed along four tables each with its own grill at the center and surrounded with bowls of kim chee, noodles, egg compote, potato salad, green salad, various spices, sauces and oils. Each group ordered three different meats from a menu banner tacked to the wall and cooked the meats themselves, throwing spices or oils on to add to the flavor of the beef tongue or rib eye or baby octopus or tripe. Once those meats were done, each table ordered more...and more...and more. In almost three hours, I think we sampled almost everything on that menu -- except for the Mountain Chain and the Collar Butt; We asked and still aren't quite sure just what those were -- and created a noise cloud with all our laughing and chatter.

Saturday we lingered around the apartment until time to head to my parents' house in Laguna for a BBQ and fireworks. The City launches the fireworks over a local lake located in a valley behind their house, and each year, my parents have a few people over for "dinner and a show". And though we were the youngest people at the party, I think Caesar enjoyed watching the bursts of color almost at eye level. He commented that he could feel the explosions thumping through his body, we were so close.

Sunday, while Caesar visited with his parents, I took it easy, watching an old '70s horror flick with Bette Davis and Oliver Reed, read a little over 200 pages of a book, watched the latest episode of Ghost Adventures, played Theresia, and finally watched a DVD rented way back in April. When he returned later in the day, we both did absolutely nothing productive -- which is as it should be on a long weekend.

A Little Monday Humor

LITTLE GIRL ON A PLANE

A stranger was seated next to a little girl on the airplane when the stranger turned to her and said, "Let's talk. I've heard that flights go quicker if you strike up a conversation with your fellow passenger."

The little girl, who had just opened her book, closed it slowly and said to the stranger, "What would you like to talk about?"

"Oh, I don't know," said the stranger. "How about nuclear power?' and he smiles.

"OK," she said. "That could be an interesting topic. But let me ask you a question first. A horse, a cow, and a deer all eat the same stuff - grass. Yet a deer excretes little pellets, while a cow turns out a flat patty, and a horse produces clumps of dried grass. Why do you suppose that is?"

The stranger, visibly surprised by the little girl's intelligence, thinks about it and says, "Hmmm, I have no idea."

To which the little girl replies, "Do you really feel qualified to discuss nuclear power when you don't know shit?"

Happy 4th of July!