Jared Shurin's Blog, page 26

Pornokitsch's Absolute and Definitive Guide To The Best of Everything in 2016

There are a lot of 'Best of 2016' lists coming out now, but they're all flawed and wrong because they don't include the things we wanted them to include. More importantly, they weren't written by us.

As our gift to the internet - and therefore the world - we've put together the Absolute and Definite Guide to the Best of Everything. It is conclusive and final, and should be used as a reference to settle all arguments.

Adam Kranz

Dark Souls 3. If FROM Software hadnt outdone themselves (and ev...

"Rogue One: A Star Wars Story" by Adam Roberts

Eggy. Rogue One (2016; directed Gareth Edwards)

[Warning: this review contains traces of eggs. Also many spoilers]

Plenty of movies nowadays contain easter eggs, something particularly true of movies that are part of a larger franchise or sequence. These nods and winks to the knowing audience members are, at root, a reflection of the way DVD, TV and digital copies of movies have changed the viewing experience. To see the original 1977 Star Wars seven times would require schlepping out to you...

"Arrival - of what, exactly?" by Mazin Saleem

The imaginary mustbe imagined, accurately and with scrupulous consistency. A fantastic setting requires vivid and specific description; while characters may lose touch with their reality, the storyteller cant.

Ursula Le Guin, review of The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro

Is there any more point to science fiction?

The history of a genre is driven in part by the dynamic between convention and invention; science fiction, though, seems to have an extra feature. Its USP is meant to be its inve...

"Hey guys, it's me again, stuck in a hole.��� - An interview with Ryan North

Jared: Romeo and/or Juliet ! It is an amazing feat! How do you even set about writing something like this?

Ryan Q North: I tried to write a non-linear second person style book before I did To Be Or Not To Be and I got nowhere. I literally did not know where to start. It's like what am I doing? This is a waste of time. I should never do this again. And I stopped; and then, when I had the idea for To Be Or Not To Be, the backbone of the Shakespeare play gave me a place to start with, a place to...

Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (1980 Review)

A review of Advanced Dungeons & Dragonsfrom Ares: The Magazine of Science Fiction and Fantasy Simulation. The core rulebooks of AD&D were published between 1977 and 1979, and this review waspublishedJuly 1980.

The timeline is importanthere, as Areswas founded and published by Simulations Publications, Inc. - which was also a producer of tactical and strategic boardgames... and role playing games like Dragonquest, coincidentally published later in 1980 (and obliquely mentioned in the final p...

Comixology's 50 Essential Graphic Novels

Listicle from Comixology!

Also, I'm not sure what I'm missing, but I only count 45 - 46 with theDeathcheat.

Batman: The Dark Knight Returns Saga (Vol. 1) Alec: The Years Have Pants The Unwritten (Vol. 1) Marvels Sandman (Vol. 1) Blacksad Ex Machina (Vol. 1) Love and Rockets - Maggie the Mechanic Love and Rockets - Heartbreak Soup Sin City (Vol. 1) Batman: The Killing Joke V for Vendetta The Walking Dead (Vol. 1) X-Men: The Dark Phoenix Saga Locke & Key (Vol. 1) Werewolves of Montpellier Che...

The Georgette Heyer Historical Fiction Prize

Georgette Heyer (the wolfhound, Misty Dawn, is not the prize).
Photograph from the Georgette Heyer Estate, via the Guardian.

Something else I've learned this week - the existence of "The Georgette Heyer Historical Fiction Prize". This was proudly emblazoned on the spine ofZemindar,which I promptly bought for 2. See, awards do sell books!

Sponsored by Corgi Books and The Bodley Head, the Georgette Heyer Historical Fiction Prizeran from 1978 to 1989. It was for discovering "new talent in hist...

Nineveh by Henrietta Rose-Innes

A flashback, as I reviewed Nineveha few years ago - I'm a Nineveh hipster!

However, the topic is well worth revisiting, as this excellent book is now published in the US and UK. You can find it onAmazon[that American cover is amazing!] and in the UK through Belgravia Books (as well as other retailers).

Katya Grubbs is an exterminator - more a relocator, actually, as shes a fundamental believer in vermins right to life. A swarm of mysterious beetles infests an idyllic suburb and Katya is hired...

Charles Altamont Doyle

We found a cute little landscape drawing in an antique shop today, but we were much more taken by the printthe reverse. Because GIANT PHEASANT ADVENTURE is pretty amazing.

Thanks to the magic of image searching, we learned that this prime piece of weirdness is actually a drawing by Charles Altamont Doyle - father of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who wrote Sherlock Holmes (well, originally, before the internet decided that he got it wrong and addedin more sex and Cthulhu monsters).

A very handy pie...

Ram��n K. P��rez: a man of many styles

Its not unusual for a comic book artists style to develop or progress as their career continues. Its a bit rarer for an artist to totally change their style or technique over time or between projects, although many artists do experiment. Its rarer still for an artist to use two totally different styles or techniques at the same time, in the same book and even on the same page... but one who does is top comic artist and cartoonist: Ramn K. Prez.

Prez was born in the 1970s to immigrant parents...