Alex C. Telander's Blog, page 57
June 22, 2013
Bookbanter Column: Diary of an Ereader, Part Four: The Ereviewer
Ebook review copies are something most people think would be the main way of reviewing books these days, but it is still pretty much a fifty-fifty split with ARCs (advanced reader copies) and finished print books.
With the development and growth of ebooks over the last few years, with the format growing in popularity each year — ebook sales are up 43% from last year — it seems logical with the world becoming more and more ecologically- and recycling-minded that reviewing books would just pretty much switch to ebook format only.
But that continues not to be the case.
Perhaps this is because just as the reading world isn’t full of ebook coverts and those fully committed to only reading books in the electronic format, the reviewing world is much the same.
June 20, 2013
“Europe Before Rome: A Site-by-Site Tour of the Stone, Bronze and Iron Ages” by T. Douglas Price (Oxford University Press, 2013)
T. Douglas Price is Weinstein Professor of European Archaeology Emeritus at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Honorary Professor in the Department of Prehistoric Archaeology at the University of Aarhus, and is the author of Images of the Past, Europe’s First Farmers and Principles of Archaeology. Europe Before Rome is a site by site exploration of a number of stone, bronze and iron age sites throughout Europe.
Europe Before Rome begins with a history lesson on early hominids leading up to the prehistoric period and into the stone age. Price uses a number of sites for specific evidence, explaining some of the importance of these sites, but never going into too much detail. After this introductory chapter, there are main chapters on “The Creative Explosion,” “The First Farmers,” “Bronze Age Warriors” and “Centers of Power, Weapons of Iron”; photos are provided, as well as diagrams where possible.
Ultimately, Europe Before Rome is more of a text book on these many different sites. Price reveals the important discoveries of many of the sites, but not really in any detail on what affect these artifacts have had on history and their importance.
Originally written on March 14, 2013 ©Alex C. Telander.
To purchase a copy of Europe Before Rome from Amazon, and help support BookBanter, click HERE.
June 18, 2013
Book News: American Werewolf Erotica in Prison, Orwell Returns, Worst Dads in Print & More
A Victory Cry for Werewolf Erotica
A judge rules it’s okay for prisoners to read werewolf erotica.
No More Nook
Barnes & Noble has removed the Nook app for PCs and Macs.
Remembering Iain Banks
Tor.com on Iain Banks’s passing.
Chinese Kindles
Kindles are now, for the first time, available in China.
June 15, 2013
“Second” by David Ely (Harper Voyager, 2013)
Originally released in 1963, and made into a movie starring Rock Hudson in 1966, David Ely’s short science fiction book has been rereleased in 2013, and feels destined to be remade into a scifi summer blockbuster. While at times the novel feels very dated, there are many themes in the book that resonate with today’s reader and everything going on in the world.
Antiochus Wilson has the classic sixties life: a decent job which he has done well in and climbed the ranks, making a decent wage; at home he has a wonderful and dutiful wife; a daughter who has grown up and is living elsewhere now; but he is bored with his life. He has a couple of hobbies, like painting sometimes in the garage, or taking his boat out, but otherwise he’s just fed-up with everything. So when he gets the address and note that will change his life, he jumps at the opportunity.
Skipping out of work on lunch, he heads to the clandestine address on the other side of town. He finds himself in a strange warehouse where a stranger tells him to put on overalls and dirty himself up a bit. Then they head to another destination incognito and so starts the first minute of his new life. Antiochus “Tony” Wilson is being given a second, new life. Agreeing on an expensive package, he is killed off; a perfect cadaver left in his place, while he undergoes reconstructive surgery and comes out a new, handsomer man. A new life is created for him: a successful artist, with a new home in California. He is famous, people love him, especially the young models who post nude for him. What could be better?
Except Antiochus Wilson, for some reason, can’t let go of his past; can’t let go of his wife, or his daughter whom he rarely saw.
Seconds, in some ways, feels like a modern James Bond movie, where women play minor secondary characters, serving the men, yet everything else feels current and meaningful. The book plays around with the concept of identity and who one really is, and the true power of family. The company that gives these men second, new lives was conceived as a brilliant breakthrough that every man would want, but that seems not to be the case.
Originally written on February 20, 2013 ©Alex C. Telander.
To purchase a copy of Seconds from Amazon, and help support BookBanter, click HERE.
June 13, 2013
“Joyland” by Stephen King (Titan Books, 2013)
Stephen King, who needs no introduction, returns with a short novel in Joyland, published by Titan books as part of the Hard Case Crime series. But even though the book is under three hundred pages, King easily tells a full and fascinating story that fans and non-King readers will easily enjoy.
Devin Jones is spending the summer at Joyland, an amusement park on the sunny coast of South Carolina. Jones isn’t doing so well; not sure whether he wants to stay in college, plus it’s the early seventies and everything seems uncertain. And the other thing is the love of his live has just broken his heart and he kind of wants his world to end.
But then he starts working at Joyland, where they don’t just sell cotton candy and prizes and rides, but most importantly, they sell fun! He begins to learn the carny life, the carny talk, and the general running of the amusement park, doing a great job as well as being the best guy at “wearing the fur.” Joyland has its mighty Ferris wheel, reaching to the stars, the various carnies who have been working there for years and have their own interesting eccentricities, and the Horror House.
Every amusement park needs its one horror ride, and Horror House is it for Joyland, and this is the ride that has the dark story about it, because some years ago a girl was murdered on the ride, her throat slashed by her supposed boyfriend, her body dumped to the side of the track. She wasn’t found until the early hours of the morning by the cleanup crew; her murderer has never been found. It is said that Horror House is now haunted and sometimes when you’re on the ride, you might see the ghost of her body floating beside you in the car, that red slit throat looking like a wide smile.
Joyland shows how much of a better writer Stephen King has become over the last decade or so, as you have a thrilling horror tale at the heart of the story, but you also have a wonderful character in the teenager, Devin Jones, who has his whole life ahead of him, but feels it is over with his broken heart. Perhaps King was pulling on his own past experience to give this story life and reality that will move the reader, making Joyland stick with them long after they’ve finished the book.
Originally written on June 12, 2013 ©Alex C. Telander.
To purchase a copy of Joyland from Amazon, and help support BookBanter, click HERE.
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June 11, 2013
Book Report: Red Wedding, Onion Advice, Typewriters & More!
Red Wedding Chapter
For those traumatized by last week’s Game of Thrones episode, the chapter from the book has been published for free to readers to find out if the book version was as graphic.
GRRM & The Onion
In a rare interview with The Onion, George R. R. Martin confesses he totally forgot about the traumatic event known as the “Red Wedding.”
The Whole Damn Thing
The future of publishing and books at BEA.
Famous Sci-fi and Fantasy Authors in their Workspaces
What does a famous author’s workspace look like? Here are some examples.
June 8, 2013
Bookbanter Column: Diary of an Ereader, Part Three: Ebook Formats
When it comes to ebooks it all about digital format, much like region settings for DVDs or — and here I’m dating myself — different old video cassette formats that only work in certain parts of the world. Ebooks come in different formats, and are actually available in a variety of different ones, but not every ebook can be available to readers in ten or twenty different formats.
Publishers and self-publishers have to put in the work at creating and converting ebooks to specific formats which costs time and money.
The good news is that the ereading world cottoned on to this fairly early and there are now essentially three main accepted formats of ebook: EPUB, MOBI and PDF.
June 6, 2013
“Ash” by James Herbert (Tor, 2012)
In Ash, bestselling British horror writer James Herbert does what he hasn’t done too often in his career, in bringing back another character. The parapsychologist David Ash first appeared in Herbert’s Haunted in 1988, and then returned in The Ghosts of Sleath in 1994. Ash is now back in his eponymous book, a lengthy 700-pager from the British master of horror.
Things are not going too well for the Psychical Institute; times are hard and apparently when money is stretched thin, people don’t need as much helping in dealing with their ghosts. But then the ultimate case arrives and the head of the institute, Kate McKean, can’t really say no, as it will mean a lot of money for them, keeping them afloat for a number of years. It involves the haunting of a secretly hidden castle deep within Scotland run by a clandestine group that is incredibly rich. Comraich Castle is where the world’s richest send their human problems, such as wanted murderers, failed warlords, illegitimate children, and the insane offspring of celebrities. Here they are kept, fed and looked after for years, or even decades, until they just waste away. McKean has brought in her best parapsychologist, David Ash. It’s a risky move, as Ash has been through a lot in the past, losing loved ones and turning into an alcoholic at one point. But this is his big chance and he’s really great at what he does.
Ash travels up to Scotland on a private jet that mid-flight suffers a failure when everything just shuts off, plunging toward the ground, and then miraculously everything comes back on and the plane resumes flight, with the pilots completed stumped as to what happened. It serves a strong warning sign of what is to come for Ash. As he begins his investigation with his tools of the trade, he finds little support from the staff at Comraich Castle, and then things just explode into the bizarre and seemingly impossible. Wild cats in the forest attacking, giant spiders deep beneath the castle in the caves, the insane locked in the dungeons uprising, and a series of hauntings that traumatize the guests.
Ash is a strange book in that it is overly long, with many pages of little happening and things just slowly passing by, and then launching into overly-dramatic action scenes that stretch out for pages and pages. Some parts are interesting and contemplative, such as some of the unusual guests at the castle, or Comraich’s dark and twisted history stretching back into medieval times. But then Herbert adds too much, with this clandestine group that has reaches into the government and royal family, akin to the Illuminati to the point where it starts to feel like a Dan Brown book; and then there’s the supposed unwanted strange child of the late Princess Diana that few have ever known about.
There are certainly some good points in Ash, and Herbert makes his book intriguing. Unfortunately, it feels as if the author lost his way when writing it, wanting to add more and more plot and subplot, and make it longer and longer, when it really should have been better edited and honed as a story. David Ash is a fractured character who also never seems to get his resolution in this at all, as things just seem to fall into place a little too easy for him, which seems pivotal when as a parapsychologist he’s not even sure what he really believes. Overall the book feels uncertain and unsure of itself, which in turn sets the reader adrift.
Originally written on February 7, 2013 ©Alex C. Telander.
To purchase a copy of Ash from Amazon, and help support BookBanter, click HERE.
June 4, 2013
New Posting Schedule
Changing up the posting schedule here at Bookbanter, because it works better with my regular life schedule to make sure I’m posting when I am, and gives you readers a post to enjoy on the weekend.
So instead of Monday, Wednesday, Friday posts, there will now be new posts on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.
That is all.
Book Report: The King’s Speech, Seven Myths of Digital Publishing, Jack Vance RIP & More!
World’s Smallest Bookstore
Nope, it’s smaller than you think.
Garth Nix’s Office
Ever wonder what an author’s office looks like?
Penguin Book Truck
Publisher Penguin has its very own book truck that will be traveling the country.
Stephen King Interview
Stephen King talks with Terry Gross on NPR.
