Todd Klein's Blog, page 124

And Then I Read: GIANT BONES by Peter S. Beagle

Cover design by Ray Lundgren.

This short story collection from 1997 is one I had missed until now. I remember loving “The Innkeeper’s Song,” to which it’s connected, but not very much about that book. As Beagle says in his introduction, the stories here are not closely tied to the earlier novel, just on the same world.

All of the stories but one are narrated by someone with a distinctive, and at times almost too omnipresent voice that tends to get in the way of the storytelling, but each story is interesting and involving all the same. “The Last Song of Siril Byar” is about a talented song-writer and bard in his final years, and how he finally comes to resolve the mental anguish of an old lover. “The Magician of Karakosk” is about a man with a natural talent for strong magic, and how it forces him from the simple country life he wants to dwell in a king’s castle and serve a ruler he does not like. “The Tragical Historie of the Jiril’s Players” follows a theater company into the halls of power, where they become pawns in the political games of the king’s family, each with a lust for the throne. “Lal and Soukyan” is the one not narrated in first person, and the one with the most connection to the earlier novel, as it follows two freelance warriors on a last mission together to settle old debts. “Chousi-wai’s Story” is connected to that one by the narrator, and tells of a thief who is hired to steal a bride. “Giant Bones” is about an ancient race of giants that is dying out, and the regular-sized person that becomes part of their final days.

As with much of Beagle’s work, there is a thread of melancholy and regret, but also humor and clever ideas. Recommended.

And Then I Read: GREEN LANTERN #7

Image © DC Comics. Written by Grant Morrison, art and colors by Liam Sharp,
letters by Tom Orzechowski.

Hal Jordan is inside his own power ring and at first unable to remember why. The previous issue’s heroic deed is why, but now he’s in the world of Myrwhidden the wizard, who is mercifully asleep, though his nightmares populate the internal world of Emerald Sands. The only other entity here is a woman, Pengowirr, constantly on the run from the nightmares. When she and Hal meet, he begins to remember who he is, and what he needs to do, but will he have time? The power ring is nearly out of power.

It was fun revisiting Myrwhidden, a character from early in the original Silver Age run of this title, and both Morrison’s text and Sharp’s visuals are beautifully ornate, impressive, and fanciful. Orzechowski’s lettering is equally good, though the narrative font could have been a little bolder for easier reading.

Recommended.

And Then I Read: THE BLACK BUCCANEER by Stephen W. Meader

I’ve read many of Meader’s adventure novels for young readers, but not this one, his first, from 1920.

Jeremy Swan is staying overnight on a small island in Penobscot Bay, Maine in July of 1718 to take care of a herd of sheep for his father, who plans to return the next day. That evening, Jeremy discovers he’s not alone. On the other side of the island a pirate ship has landed. The pirates discover Jeremy spying on them, and carry him off with them to work aboard their ship. Thus begins a harrowing tale of pirate life along the eastern coast of America at a time when there were no protections for cargo ships other than their speed and guns, if any. The Revenge, captained by Major Bonnet, was speedy and well-armed, and her cruel crew were not adverse to boarding a vessel they had disabled with their guns and killing anyone aboard. Jeremy has a rough time of it, especially when crewman Pharaoh Daggs takes a notion he’s bad luck. When the crew kidnaps the son of a wealthy merchant to hold for ransom, at least Jeremy has someone his own age to talk to, and when the two of them find out about Daggs’ secret treasure map, they become even more desperate to escape his evil influence.

A great read that owes much to Stevenson’s “Treasure Island” and “Kidnapped,” but has plenty to thrills to offer. Meader at this early point in his career is more willing to tell the truth about pirate life as he’s researched it, and this book is the bloodiest of any he wrote, I bet. The plot is unpredictable, the characters are appealing, and everything feels authentic.

The illustrations are by Meader himself, and poorly reproduced in this public domain reprint, but even so, it’s clear that his writing was better than his drawing.

Recommended.

And Then I Read: THE QUANTUM AGE

I lettered the prologue for this BLACK HAMMER spinoff, it appeared in a Free Comic Book Day comic. The rest was lettered by Nate Piekos, who did a fine job of matching the styles I established for the characters.

As inspiration, it takes the Legion of Super-Heroes as a model. 100 years in the future, a group of teens with super-powers band together to fight crime, inspired by the original Black Hammer heroes. In typical Black Hammer fashion, the brief golden age goes dark when Earth is invaded by Martians, and then becomes a police state/dictatorship run by Gravitus, one of the former Quantum League team.

Several of the other former Quantum Leaguers have survived in hiding, and in this series they once again band together with untried heroes to attempt to take control away from Gravitus. They receive unexpected help from several of the original Black Hammer heroes, including the daughter of the original Black Hammer. It’s a well told tale with lots of twists and turns, great characters, some melancholy, some heroics, and a little humor, as you might expect from Jeff Lemire. Artist Wilfredo Torres does an excellent job of capturing that “Legion” vibe from the 1970s while remaining true to the Black Hammer characters established by Dean Ormston. Dave Stewart provides his excellent colors, and everything about this book was a pleasure to read.

Recommended.

And Then I Read: PEBBLE by Julia Jones

Cover illustration by Claudia Myatt

Since 2012, author and sailboat owner Jones has been quietly building a great adventure line, the “Strong Winds” series. This is book six, featuring a large family of children and their friends in England’s East Anglia district on the island’s east coast. All of them include sailing adventures as well as gripping suspenseful plots with themes from today’s world, and very real characters with serious problems to overcome. This one includes Russian spies and the possible beginning of a new Cold War.

Liam is the youngest family member at age 10, and his understanding of the world is informed by the things that have happened to his family, which often include danger from the sea. He tries to watch out for them, but is having an ever-harder time at it. A trip with his friend Donny in the Chinese junk sailing ship “Strong Winds” seems like a good escape from his worries, but problems with his vision that he hardly even admits to himself lead the boat astray and create a whole new level of trouble, including a mysterious box of radioactive material and Russian hit-men on their case. Liam’s sister Anna’s Russian boyfriend and his family are involved, and soon the rest of the family are too, including Liam’s famous musician mother and physically impaired father. Meanwhile, Heike, on a work visa from Eastern Europe, is restoring a small sailing dinghy for Anna and decides to deliver it by sailing it down the coast to the family’s home. She’s soon involved in the spy trouble, too, and her hatred for Russians isn’t helping.

Julia Jones began this series inspired by Arthur Ransome’s “Swallows and Amazons” books about kids and sailing, several of which take place in the same area, but she has found her own path by making these stories about the world and problems of today as well as kids having fun, and being resourceful and brave. I highly recommend the entire series, but any of them can be read on their own.

And Then I Read: KILDEE HOUSE by Rutherford Montgomery

Jerome Kildee had spent his solitary life as a tombstone carver who rarely spoke more than a few words to anyone. The money he saved for retirement helped him buy a plot of land on the northern California coast, and at the base of a giant Redwood, he built his small retirement home, where he expected to take things easy. The wild animals became his friends, and they liked his house too. Before long he had a family of raccoons living with him, and a family of skunks living under the floor. As those families grew, Joseph became rather desperate to find homes for them. His new friend, Emma Lou from down the hill tries to help him, though they are both troubled by rich neighbor boy Donald, who sees the animals only as hunting prey for his dog.

This charming story was a Newbery Honor Roll book in 1950. I’d never heard of it, but a story about a solitary man and nature sold me, and I enjoyed reading it. This reprint is from 1993. Recommended.

And Then I Read: HEX WIVES #4

Image © Ben Blacker and DC Comics. Written by Ben Blacker, art by Mirka Andolfo,
colors by Marissa Louise, letters by Josh Reed, cover by Paulina Ganucheau

The housewives in this story (who are actually witches but don’t know it) are heading toward an awakening, which is triggered by fresh blood. Becky is the first to discover this, though she and her friends haven’t quite been able to believe in the power it unleashed, or the method, at least so far. They’re working on it. The cabal of husbands in their underground bunker think they have the women completely under control, using tactics from gaslighting to drugs to distraction, but it can’t last. When the genie is out of the the bottle, so to speak, there will be big trouble for the men. That makes this story worth following, and I’m enjoying the slow build-up. I particularly like the colors by Marissa Louise in this issue, but the writing, art and lettering are good as well.

Recommended.

And Then I Read: HEART’S BLOOD by Jane Yolen

Cover illustration by Dominick Domingo

This is the second book of the Pit Dragon trilogy. Book one, “Dragon’s Blood” was a coming-of-age story in which young Jakkim steals and trains a dragon on his world of Austar IV, a former penal colony, now a semi-independent world known for dragon-fighting in arenas and the gambling on them. Jakkim had been a bondsman to dragon-trainer Sarkkhan, but won his freedom in the first book, though he still works with his own dragon, Heart’s Blood, in Sarkkhan’s training compound.

Here the story becomes more political as Jakkim is tasked with finding and rescuing Sarkkhan’s daughter Akki, who vanished a year earlier and is either working with or a prisoner of a group of rebels in the world’s capital city of Rokk. With the help of a senator and Sarkkhan, Jakkim will attempt the dangerous business of infiltrating the rebels, who want to free Austar IV from all ties to the larger galactic empire, and will resort to any kind of violence to do so. He must also enter Heart’s Blood in arena fights as his cover, even though she is pregnant.

I enjoyed this book, perhaps not quite as much as the first one, but it does have interesting characters and enough plot twists to keep me guessing, ending in a very different way than I expected. The double KK in every name gets a bit old, but otherwise it’s well written. Recommended.

And Then I Read: PLANET OF THE NERDS #2

Image © Paul Constant, Alan Robinson and Ahoy Comics.
Main story written by Constant, art by Robinson.
Backup story written by Constant, art by Randy Elliott.
Colors by Felipe Sobreiro, letters by Rob Steen.
Cover by David Nakayama.

In this reverse approach to “Back to the Future,” three jocks have been cryogenically frozen for thirty years, and are now trying to deal with today’s world where everything they think of as nerdy is popular, or even necessary to navigate their new reality. Starting out at a comics convention makes their plight all the more obvious, especially when one of the three, blond football player Chad, seems filled with rage he’s barely able to control. When police are called, their military appearance frightens even Chad, and the three run off, but with little idea what to do next. They have little money, and no way to reach anyone who might know them. If only they could find the nerdy kid who got them into this mess…

A fun idea well handled, though Chad’s anger is getting a bit tiresome. The backup story about Drew is quite good, too, and more thoughtful than the comedy of errors the main story has been so far.

Recommended.

Bird Photos with a New Spotting Scope

Black-bellied Plover, some Semi-palmated Plovers, and Semi-palmated Sandpipers.
This and all photos © Todd Klein

Tomorrow is the World Series of Birding. I’m not in it this year, as I have a family event to attend, but I’m still having fun birdwatching, and now, taking photos with my new Swarovski ATX scope. Spotting scopes aren’t always helpful with birding, particularly in the woods, but where you’re looking at distant birds that aren’t moving too fast, they’re ideal. Around 1987 I bought a Bushnell scope which was state of the art at the time, but today’s scopes are vastly better. I’ve long thought about buying a new one, and finally did about a week ago, from New Jersey Audubon’s Cape May Bird Observatory.

Scope and tripod.

As I volunteer there, they gave me a great price, but it’s still a large investment. In addition to the scope I needed a new tripod made by Manfrotti, and I wanted an adapter for my iPhone to take photos with it through the scope. Swarovski doesn’t have one for my phone model yet, but they have one with variable size sliders that works okay, but is somewhat difficult to use. I’m gradually getting the hang of it.

Scope with phone mount.

At this point, birds that are standing still are about all I can capture by the time I get the scope on the bird, the phone adapter on the scope, the phone in the adapter, the phone’s camera on and at the right setting, and everything in focus. Fortunately, some birds do stand still! The shorebirds in the top photo are from my first digiscoping attempt at Heislerville, NJ. (Digiscoping is the new word for this, taking digital photos through a scope.)

Black Skimmers in front of Great Black-backed Gulls.

This one is also from Heislerville.

Black-crowned Night-Heron.

Years ago, rare birds and the best places to see them were passed on among birders by word of mouth or by phone. These days, as you might guess, there’s an app for that. eBird is the app, and in addition to being a great way to keep track of your own sightings, you can subscribe to rare bird sightings in your area. Acting on eBird info, today I drove a little north and east to the Ocean City, New Jersey Welcome Center on Route 52, where a large nesting colony of herons, egrets, ibis and other birds can be seen easily from the elevated parking lot. You’re actually above the level of most nests, and looking down into them, making for ideal photo ops.

Yellow-crowned Night-heron.

There are two species of Night-herons in this area, and they’re often hard to find, since they feed mostly at night, but if you can find a nesting sight with good views, the photo potential is great. These are large birds, almost the size of a hen turkey, and beautifully marked.

There were about a dozen Black-crowns and over twenty Yellow-crowns visible from the parking lot, and you could even see the eggs in a few nests, a first for me.

They are amazingly beautiful and graceful birds. We won’t talk about their croaky voices, though, nothing’s perfect…

But the best bird here, and the one that convinced me to make the trip, is this White Ibis, which is rare in New Jersey. It’s been at this nesting colony for a few days with more common Glossy Ibises. This is a WOW shot for me!

I’ll add two more, why not?

I’ve seen them in Florida, but never in New Jersey, and aren’t they stunning? I’m definitely feeling ththat buying the scope and phone adapter was worth it!

One more photo from today, not with the scope, but just the phone camera, because I like it. The first Eastern Box Turtle of the year in our yard, very orange and handsome!