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June 28
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Platoeatssouls
gave
 
to:
Lex Luthor: Man of Steel (Paperback)
by Brian Azzarello
bookshelves:
comics,
theboxmarkeddone
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my rating:
Added to my books!
add my review
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recommended for: comic lovers
read in June, 2008
Platoeatssouls said:
"If you've ever delved into the Superman comics at all, you've come across Lex Luthor, the billionaire who makes it his business to make life difficult for Our Hero. The back story between him and Clark Kent is pretty compelling stuff - friendship an...more
If you've ever delved into the Superman comics at all, you've come across Lex Luthor, the billionaire who makes it his business to make life difficult for Our Hero. The back story between him and Clark Kent is pretty compelling stuff - friendship and betrayal in rural Kansas. But this isn't that story.
Brian Azzarello has interrogated Lex and come back with six issues of reasons to hate the Big Nietzschian Joke. There's nothing not to like here - the storytelling is tight, the art is gorgeous and wonderfully consistent, and the story itself is perfect for Lex: rational on the surface, but with a depth of sadism to keep the sympathy at bay. Lex is always restrained and gentlemanly, but always ready to go for the jugular when you turn your head just right. He's always brutal, never losing himself in mawkish nostalgia. Best of all is the dichotomy between what he claims in his narration and the often brutal truths of his actions.
If you're looking for a good, quick read, or something which can show a neophyte how good comics can be, this is one for you....less
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June 15
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Platoeatssouls
is currently reading:
A Corpse in the Koryo (Hardcover)
by James Church
bookshelves:
currently-reading
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my rating:
Added to my books!
add my review
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Platoeatssouls
is currently reading:
The Name of the Rose: including Postscript to the Name of the Rose (Paperback)
by Umberto Eco
bookshelves:
currently-reading
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my rating:
Added to my books!
add my review
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Platoeatssouls
gave
to:
Coup D'etat (Paperback)
by Ed Brubaker, Joe Casey
bookshelves:
comics,
theboxmarkeddone
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in June, 2008
Platoeatssouls said:
"There's a lot going on here which is worthy of comment.
First of all, it's worth noting that this isn't just an Authority comic. It's sort of pan-universe (Wildstorm universe, if you care), so there's an Authority one, a "Sleeper" one, ...more
There's a lot going on here which is worthy of comment.
First of all, it's worth noting that this isn't just an Authority comic. It's sort of pan-universe (Wildstorm universe, if you care), so there's an Authority one, a "Sleeper" one, a "WildC.A.T.s Version 3.0", and one "Stormwatch: Team Achilles". I'm unfamiliar with Sleeper and Wildcats and I have only passing familiarity with Stormwatch (I read it up to the point where it spun off the Authority). So my opinion is coloured by that. You probably need some familiarity with the Authority to understand what's going on here.
I cannot for the life of me summarize this. A bloke named Tao manipulates the US Government into blowing up an alien ship, the fallout from which destroys Florida. In return, the Authority takes over the US Government, killing the President as a "peace offering" to members of the alien race (called "The Vigil"). And then, instead of holding elections, they decide to build a better world.
In some ways, this seems clear-cut enough: the government gets a lot of people killed needlessly, so get a better government. Patrick Kent (the US President, a poorly veiled Bush[1:]) is a jerk, so why not get rid of him? I'm sure no liberal could claim they'd never had this fantasy. And yet the Authority's manipulation of the general public and the Vigil (to whom they show a doctored up tape) makes them no better than those they've deposed, especially when they seem to easily defeat the Vigil when they begin their (inevitable retaliatory) attack. Instead of either drawing a clear line between good and evil, or showing both sides as equally noble and the issue as gray, Morrison, Brubaker, et al, paint everyone as corrupt, which makes the whole thing less amusing.
Additionally, I can't help but feel that taking over the US is almost too small of a task for the Authority, who at one point killed god and who have previously taken on the governments of Russia, China, and Indonesia without instituting themselves as a junta. What makes the US more important than everyone else? There's lingering tensions from the old Stormwatch days, sure (the US doesn't like superheros much), but that hardly seems to make it more important than anyone else.
Partially because of how the comic industry works, there seems to be a lot of time spent doing BIG story arcs which bring various characters together and examine their interactions. Unfortunately, these rarely develop any of the ideas to the point which the reader would like, focusing on quantity over quality. Coup D'Etat is ultimately the same: an intriguing premise, a lot of waffling in the middle, and ultimately a let-down. When Midnighter says, "Well, now what?" at the end, I'm not really temped to rush out and get the next one in the series to keep reading.
Positives: a little Midnigher/Apollo snarkage (a very little), plus Apollo gets a few lines to prove he's more than a handsome, brainless blond. A fair amount of Jack (being kind of broody, another throwback to Stormwatch). The art in 3 of the 4 books is good (Portacio, I'm looking at you. What the hell happened?)
Negatives: Plot too small for the characters. Art in the last one is terrible. A lot of the panels and dialog boxes are laid out in a way suggesting the person who laid them out had never read a comic before. Definitely in need of a tighter editorial process.
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[1:] Poorly veiled enough that using the word "veiled" seems rather ironic, honestly....less
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June 08
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Platoeatssouls
gave
to:
Hellboy Volume 1: Seed of Destruction (Paperback)
by Mike Mignola, John Byrne
bookshelves:
comics
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my rating:
Added to my books!
add my review
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recommended to Platoeatssouls by:
my brother
recommended for: comic readers
read in June, 2008
Platoeatssouls said:
"Funny and sharp. A bit too much repetitive back story within the issues, but it was initially a serial comic, so that can be forgiven. My major quarrel is with the copy I picked up: something seems to be wrong with the binding, and the pages are fa...more
Funny and sharp. A bit too much repetitive back story within the issues, but it was initially a serial comic, so that can be forgiven. My major quarrel is with the copy I picked up: something seems to be wrong with the binding, and the pages are falling out already. Otherwise, I'm pretty sold, I have to say. There's plenty here to keep you reading the next volumes....less
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May 02
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New comment on Platoeatssouls's review of
No Country for Old Men
(see all 4 comments)
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April 27
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Platoeatssouls
gave
to:
To the Edge: A Man, Death Valley, and the Mystery of Endurance (Paperback)
by Kirk Johnson
bookshelves:
theboxmarkeddone
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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recommended for: runners
read in March, 2008
Platoeatssouls said:
"Following his brother's death, NY Times reporter Kirk Johnson decided to become a runner. But he wasn't interested in doing any old race - he had his heart set on running the Badwater Ultramarathon, a 135-mile race across Death Valley, widely regard...more
Following his brother's death, NY Times reporter Kirk Johnson decided to become a runner. But he wasn't interested in doing any old race - he had his heart set on running the Badwater Ultramarathon, a 135-mile race across Death Valley, widely regarded as the most difficult footrace in the world. This book chronicles his descent into ultrarunning and (simultaneously) gonzo journalism.
In a normal newspaper story, the reporter remains at a distance from his subject - there is no "I", and so the tone is (perceived as) objective, rather than subjective, or at least that is what they strive for. In gonzo journalism, the journalist inserts the "I" and truly becomes "one of those crazies" (as he says), which is what happens here. While this gives a more interesting look at Mr. Johnson's struggle to go from a non-runner to an elite athlete over the course of a year, it also skews the perspective one gets of the race. Other participants wander in and out, never fully characterized beyond their most recognizable qualities - this one had cancer, these ones are twins, this one is an amputee.
The lack of distance is obviously something Mr. Johnson is neither used to nor comfortable with; he spends a significant portion of the book returning, like a good Times reporter, to the history of the race and that of Death Valley. The information is interesting, but ultimately irrelevant, and the book would have done better had he simply surrendered, Hunter S. Thompson-like, to the pull of the race.
This "distant lack of distance" works to his disadvantage in another way: Mr. Johnson is never entirely successful in exploring his reasons for beginning the Badwater journey. Just as he has no explanation for his brother's suicide, he seems to have no reasons for whatever drove him to commit this much time and energy to so strange a quest; the few he comes up with (to be closer to his brother, primarily) are never closely examined, and cannot be, because his brother is never really fleshed out as a character.
The story, while interesting, had the potential to be truly moving - a tale of self-discovery and healing. But instead of the reader feeling the sentiments, we're left with the sense that the author pointed at a photo and said, "This was very moving". Nice try, but we remain unaffected. Whether this is a quality of Mr. Johnson's writing or simply a fact of trying to deal with a difficult subject, I cannot say. The book is worth a look if you're interested in running and its history....less
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April 04
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Platoeatssouls
gave
to:
No Country for Old Men (Paperback)
by Cormac McCarthy
bookshelves:
theboxmarkeddone
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my rating:
Added to my books!
add my review
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recommended for: people who like it dark
read in April, 2008
Platoeatssouls said:
"A literary critic (of whom I am not fond) by the name of Harold Bloom referred to Cormac McCarthy as one of the four living (and still working) American novelists who write "the Style of our age", saying they have composed canonical works. ...more
A literary critic (of whom I am not fond) by the name of Harold Bloom referred to Cormac McCarthy as one of the four living (and still working) American novelists who write "the Style of our age", saying they have composed canonical works. So with this ringing in my ears, and the film version still playing through my mind, I decided to read the book.
Cormac McCarthy writes about the west, but not the vaguely-homoerotic wild west that we all know and love. This is West Texas, where there's antelope and dust and drugs and a bunch of stuff that's been around forever and not a whole lot else. The men are tough and taciturn; they don't use apostrophes or quotation marks, they're slow to anger and quick to strike once roused. They love their wives with a slow, steady passion. Their wives, on the other hand, are strong, steely women who do well by their menfolk (of course they're called "menfolk".) They may carry weapons, but in the end they're not too important, mostly functioning as reasons for the men to do the things they do.
The book's central thesis (or, I suppose, one of them; books are relatively poor places for straightforward philosophy) is this: you make choices as you go through life. There are rules and other, smaller choices you make which propel you along. And then eventually there's an accounting.
In some ways, it's similar to the "alternative universe" trope beloved by science fiction writers, except here the "what if" part of the universe doesn't matter. Only what happened is actually relevant. People live their lives thinking every day is a fresh start, that they can somehow divorce themselves from their pasts, but in a certain sense the past is the only thing that exists. Your past defines you, just as the past of the country defines what America is today.
This is not, as it happens, a philosophy I particularly buy into. But that's neither here nor there.
What surprises me is how McCarthy drags us through nearly 300 pages looking over the shoulders of Llewellyn Moss, Sheriff Ed Tom Bell, and Anton Chigurh without ever really letting us into their lives. The way he uses and discards them makes it difficult to get attached, and none of them are especially likable (though I'll admit they each of them have their own particular charms). The plot, revolving around a drug deal gone bad and a big case of stolen money, is interesting but never really tied up - it's mostly a MacGuffin to keep the characters on the move, which is disappointing; you'd think that if you spent as long as CM must have writing a book this full of ideas, you'd have taken a few minutes to fix that.
The book was engrossing, true; I spent more than one lunch hour buried within its occasionally agrammatical pages. But though I liked it, I remain unconvinced that McCarthy is as good a writer as Bloom seems to think. The word I'm searching for, I believe, is "overrated". It's much like Bloom himself in that regard....less
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Platoeatssouls
gave
to:
Ultramarathon Man: Confessions of an All-Night Runner (Paperback)
by Dean Karnazes
bookshelves:
theboxmarkeddone
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my rating:
Added to my books!
add my review
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recommended for: runners and people who love them
read in April, 2008
Platoeatssouls said:
"Dean Karnazes is a runner, specifically one of a small group of elite athletes called ultramarathoners - people who run more than 26.2 miles at a go, but typically at least 50 kilometers and often more than 100 miles without rest.
As a runner myse...more
Dean Karnazes is a runner, specifically one of a small group of elite athletes called ultramarathoners - people who run more than 26.2 miles at a go, but typically at least 50 kilometers and often more than 100 miles without rest.
As a runner myself, I tend to get my share of odd looks when I mention I spent my weekend running eight or nine miles. But this guy gets looks on a whole different level. For me, on any given day I can run five miles without too much trouble. He can run a marathon.
This book is his attempt to answer questions that everyone asks him: Why do you run? How do you do it?
The trouble is, these questions aren't easily answered, even for someone as well educated as Mr. Karnazes, who has obviously spent a lot of time thinking about them. His best moment comes early on, when he quips, "Addictions are never neatly defined." The rest of the book spends a lot of time trying, then, to describe a particular feeling that (much as it pains me to admit, being a writer) is fairly indescribable: the painful, euphoric sensation that you get when you run really far, pushing your limits, if not the limits of what a human being can accomplish. The "how" gets glossed over as well, because the answer is one that people who don't run will never really believe: you get to be a long distance runner by putting on your shoes and running every day.
Despite the fact that his answers are essentially, "Lots of reasons" and "You wouldn't really believe me anyway", the book has a lot of promise. It misses out on being a truly moving memoir - it's more a recitation of events, without any real characterization or narrative arc - but it's damn interesting and more than a little inspiring, which is pretty good....less
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March 03
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Platoeatssouls
gave
to:
Truth and Bright Water: A Novel (Paperback)
by Thomas King
bookshelves:
theboxmarkeddone
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my rating:
Added to my books!
add my review
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recommended for: people who like being happy
read in March, 2008
Platoeatssouls said:
"As I may have remarked before, characters in Thomas King's books speak to each other in strange parabolas. Characters who aren't the narrator are tightly wrapped up in their own impenetrable problems and give up very little, and only grudgingly. St...more
As I may have remarked before, characters in Thomas King's books speak to each other in strange parabolas. Characters who aren't the narrator are tightly wrapped up in their own impenetrable problems and give up very little, and only grudgingly. Stories are told which tell more about the listener than the teller; in the end, the voyage is internal.
In Truth and Bright Water, Thomas King takes us through a handful of days in the life of Tecumseh and Lum, teenagers on the Bright Water reserve in Canada and the town of Truth across the river in Truth as they approach Indian Days. But to boil it down to this is to leave out the bittersweet taste of the summer and the ideas about how people use stories to organize their lives. I am a fan....less
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