Gerald Everett Jones's Blog: Gerald Everett Jones - Author, page 58

Book Review: Our Kind of Traitor

The master breaks all the rules. Main character Perry is not a spy but a wannabe patriot, an amateur screw-up with a good heart. Contrary to conventional story-structure rules, he is not the driver of the plot and he is absent for big chunks of the narrative. At those times, pro spy Luke steps in, but he doesn't drive the story either. Perry and his lawyer girlfriend Gail are mirrored by Luke and his spook sidekick Yvonne, but even as a group they are not a main character. (At best, Perry is a sympathetic character because he mirrors the reader in his fascination with the undercover world.)


Master-spy, case-officer Hector holds the strings, but he is never in control, a dismal fact of geopolitical reality that becomes increasingly obvious as the plot devolves. (Almost) everyone is trying to protect wannabe defector Dima, king of the Russian mob's money launderers (think Otto Preminger). Dima is the biggest personality on the stage, and ultimately the only one who is unabashedly brave.

The author holds true to his oft-used theme that personal betrayal is the ultimate sin, which the career spy can't help but do and for which he deserves to die.

(Sigh) The master breaks all the rules and still hits it out of the park. The Hollywood script consultants-for-hire will say don't try this at home.

(Photo credit: Bain News Service)

Gerald Everett Jones
La Puerta Productions
www.lapuerta.tv

Book Review: For the King by Catherine Delors

All historical fiction is about today. That goes for works old and new. The old works are being experienced by contemporary readers, and the material filters through a modern mindset. Conversely, and  more to the point here, a contemporary work such as For the King by Catherine Delors was conceived in her unarguably modern mind. (Ignore the fact that this charming author is so steeped in French history she can blog about little else.) The modern writer's preoccupations and prejudices seep thr...

Book Review: The Man Who Would Not Die

My friend and colleague Tom Page wrote The Man Who Would Not Die - twice. No, I'm not talking about the multitude of drafts, experimental and otherwise, that any writer generates when producing a book. Back in 1981, Tom first wrote, and then Seaview Books published, what has now become a cult sci-fi classic about a handsome rake on inconveniently non-terminal life support. Then came a Signet edition, then one from Hamlyn.

Fast forward through intevening years, when predicably but unaccountably...

Der Ring Roundup - Everything You Need to Know About Siegfried and His Friends

If you think Achim Freyer's character design for the evil dwarf Alberich looks like a Nazi cartoon stereotype of a Jewish banker, you are a student of history.

Now that Los Angeles Opera is in the midst of three consecutive cyles of Richard Wagner's Ring Cycle, here's a recap of all four operas:

Wagner's Ring Cycle at LA Opera - Recap for Late Deciders



Photo by Monika Rittershaus courtesy LA OperaGerald Everett Jones
La Puerta Productions
www.lapuerta.tv

It's a One-Man Show

No, I'm not talking about the story of my life. Last night Georja and I took in the opening night of Palomino , David Cale's storyteller performance about a New York gigolo. More than thoroughly in touch with his feminine side, Cale also plays the fellow's lady clients, as well as a gay book publisher who (wait for this surprise) rejects his memoirs. May 13 - June 6 at the Kirk Douglas Theatre in Culver City.

It's about casual intimacy and loneliness. If you're not sure how one is inevitably en...

Alas, Poor Ubermensch Boychik

As Wagner fans all over the world know by now, the Los Angeles Opera is engaged in an audacious two-year project to stage Achim Freyer's postmodern version of the Ring Cycle. Having attended the first three operas in sequence, Georja Umano and I just sat through Gotterdamerung, the last installment, which shows the destruction of the gods, in five hours and twenty minutes and two intermissions. Read our review for LASplash here: Gotterdamerung Review - A Thrilling End to the Ring.

I've commen...

Read an eBook Week March 7 - 13

In this new Smashwords.com promotion, you'll find Rollo Hemphill's misadventures My Inflatable Friend and Rubber Babes in popular formats, including EPUB (Nook), HTML, and Sony Reader.

(Also available in Kindle from Amazon, and PDF at Diesel eBooks.)Gerald Everett Jones
La Puerta Productions
www.lapuerta.tv

Vicious Cross-Posting!

Photo by Jeff Kubinahttp://www.flickr.com/photos/kubina/ / CC BY-SA 2.0
A writer friend and colleague of mine recently complained in the IWOSC forum that his press release had mysteriously appeared on a strange website. Here's my (cross-posted) reply:

"The situation you find about your press releases being posted on other blogs has happened to me quite a few times.

I'm not an expert in these matters, but my interpretation is this. Your PR release is essentially a public document because you've p...

Book Review: Noah's Compass by Anne Tyler

In the virtual scheme of things, my comic-novel hero Rollo Hemphill is now twentysomething. So it might at first seem odd that I'd review a book about a curmudgeon. Perhaps Anne Tyler's sixty-one-year-old Liam Pennywell is simply Rollo in flash forward, a boychik who wakes up one morning to find out his youth is so yesterday.

Here's some brief background, no more than you'll read in brief publicity blurbs: Liam is teacher in a private school in Baltimore. He was trained in philosophy and his a...

Rollo Scores in India!

I was pleased to learn that the adventures of Rollo Hemphill are selling at Flipkart.com, an active online bookstore site in India.Gerald Everett Jones
La Puerta Productions
www.lapuerta.tv