Kyle Warner's Blog, page 19

Book Review: Finders Keepers by Stephen King

I enjoyed Stephen King’s step into thriller territory with last year’s Mr. Mercedes more than most, it would seem (my review on Goodreads). While I remember thinking that that book was lacking in genuine surprises, I liked where it went, I enjoyed my time with the characters, and I thought it was a successful novel overall. It was quickly revealed that Mr. Mercedes was the first entry in a trilogy surrounding retired detective Bill Hodges and his unlikely allies Holly and Jerome. Finders Kee...

Reviews & Recommendations: May and June 2015

This review & recommendation roundup is going to be a short one. Since last time I have finished writing one book (woo!) and have started editing another book (not my favorite thing to do but I am getting better at it). I’ve been busy. Anyway. Enough excuses! Onto the stuff.
Books The Deep by Nick Cutter – I counted Nick Cutter’s previous horror novel The Troop as one of my favorites of 2014. The Troop is a dark, gruesome tale of a troop of boy scouts dealing with a slimy horror that gets in...

The Man with the Devil's Tongue on Wattpad and a Death's Good Intentions Kindle Sale

My paranormal thriller The Man with the Devil's Tongue can now be read in its entirety on Wattpad.I'm still new to Wattpad and haven't really used it much yet. It seems like a cool place -- readers and writers get to interact and share their stories. Everything on Wattpad is free to read, so that's cool.In addition to publishing the complete novella of The Man with the Devil's Tongue to Wattpad, I also added excerpts for Blood Child and Death's Good Intentions.

Like I said, you can only read a...

Jurassic World

My childhood movie is Jurassic Park . It’s my Star Wars, my Harry Potter, my Spider-Man, you get it.

Like a lot of kids, I was inexplicably drawn to dinosaurs. I mean, dragon-like beasts once walked the earth. How cool is that? So along comes this film with special effects that present dinosaurs as realistically as possible. And I loved it. I think Jurassic Park (I saw Spielberg’s film first, then fell in love with Crichton’s book) was the driving force behind me wanting to become a sto...

Writing Update

It's been a while since I’ve talked about my upcoming books, so I figured I’d give a little update here.

Last week I finished the first draft of a new historical adventure novel that I’m feeling pretty good about. With that done (for now), I am currently faced with a whole lot of editing for various projects.

Let’s see…

I’m a couple drafts into the post-apocalyptic kaiju epic In the Shadow of Extinction . This thing is a monster of a book (PUN!) and so the writing/editing is really like tackl...

MAD MAX: FURY ROAD - a rambling appreciation post

Holy shit, right?

What a movie.

There was a time when it seemed like this film was never going to get made. Some version of Mad Max 4 was considered back in the early 2000s with Mel Gibson likely returning to the role that made him famous. The Iraq War, the collapse of the dollar, and The Passion of the Christ made it so that didn't happen. Fast-forward about ten years and the film gets a second chance. However, even then there seemed to be a prevailing sense among the film fan community...

Reviews & Recommendations: March and April 2015

Heyyy. So, I did this before and I figured I might as well do it again. Here are my film and fiction reviews and recommendations for the months of March and April. If you are interested in purchasing any of the titles featured here, I would appreciate you clicking the appropriate image which will bring you to that item on Amazon. It’s an affiliate link, which means it’ll help me out a bit if you buy the item through that link. Hey, every little bit counts, right? Anyway! ONTO THE STUFF.  Film As I mentioned last time, I’m now contributing film reviews to the website www.CityOnFire.com. City on Fire specializes in Asian action cinema, but there’s a lot of crossover into cult classics and genre films from all over the world. Being a fan of these sort of films, I’m rather enjoying contributing some reviews and shining the spotlight on films that may otherwise go unnoticed by Western audiences.
Ran —Akira Kurosawa’s final epic masterpiece. Ran is a Japanese retelling of Shakespeare’s King Lear. In the role of Lear we have Lord Hidetora (Tatsuya Nakadai, Yojimbo ), an aging samurai warlord who decides to split his kingdom up amongst his three sons. One son calls him a senile old fool and is banished. Of course, the banished son is soon proven correct. The two other sons start a war, setting fire to everything that Hidetora had built. This is a brilliant film and I believe it’s one of those movies that everyone who loves cinema needs to see. It’s a sweeping epic, a fantastic Shakespeare adaptation, and quite simply one of the best films of all time. Read my full review at City on Fire, which goes into the production and shares a bit of info on Kurosawa’s later period. Blind Woman’s Curse – Ever heard of Arrow Video? Well, if Masters of Cinema is the UK’s answer to the Criterion Collection, then Arrow is the UK’s Shout Factory. Good news, kids! Arrow has crossed the pond and will now begin releasing Blu-Rays in both the UK and the US (some licensing restrictions keep them from releasing everything in the US, though). The first Arrow release that I got my hands on was this bizarre Japanese horror/crime flick called Blind Woman’s Curse. It stars Meiko Kaji ( Lady Snowblood ) as a female yakuza boss that’s at odds with both a rival gang and a strange blind woman who goes around with an evil cat and a crazy hunchback. It’s pretty wild. I’d seen the film before I was given this disc for review purposes, but some of the imagery still shocked me a second time around. Read my full review here.  Day of Anger —One of the best spaghetti westerns not made by Sergio Leone. Lee Van Cleef stars as a dangerous stranger to takes a town’s unloved servant under his wing and trains him to be a gunfighter. It’s a tale of corruption, as a good young man is made cruel under the tutelage of a violent gunslinger. I really liked this one. Fans of westerns and Lee Van Cleef should definitely consider checking it out. The Arrow Blu-Ray features beautiful picture quality. Read my full review at City on Fire. Massacre Gun —A jazzy yakuza film noir starring fan favorite Jo Shishido ( Branded to Kill ). This is not one of the best or the most original of Japan’s crime pictures, but it has a little bit of everything that fans of the genres love. Similarly, it seems to me that Massacre Gun is also a good starting point for those curious about classic yakuza crime films. Cool photography, cool score, cool action-packed finale, and of course Jo Shishido, one of the coolest actors there is. The Arrow Blu-Ray has some nice features, like an interview with Shishido and an interview with film historian Tony Rayns. Read my review over at COF. Mark of the Devil —Well, this one’s a bit unpleasant. When this highly controversial film was first shown in US theatres, the filmgoers were given barf bags. Today Mark of the Devil is not as shocking as it once was… but it is pretty nasty. The film is about the witch trials that happened in Europe hundreds of years ago, when superstition and corruption led to the deaths of countless innocents. Mark of the Devil is a lot like the Vincent Price horror film The Witchfinder General , but with more blood and sleaze. I can’t say I loved the film, but I get why it has its fans. The Arrow Blu-Ray is packed with special features, so those fans should be very happy with the release. Read my full review. The Admiral: Roaring Currents —This historical epic is South Korea’s biggest box office hit of all time. It tells the story of an admiral and his dozen warships which stood against hundreds of Japanese ships at a tipping point in Korea’s history. It's a story of great national pride, which probably explains why it was such a huge success. Foreign audiences likely won’t connect with it the same way that the Korean audiences did. It’s a flawed film. The Admiral has great action sequences and a strong performance from Choi Min-sik ( Lucy ), but some sappy melodrama and over-the-top depiction of evil Japanese really hurt the film. Read my full review at City on Fire. Incident at Blood Pass —Toshiro Mifune’s most popular character of all time was the nameless ronin in the film Yojimbo (which would go onto to inspire one of Clint Eastwood’s greatest characters in A Fistful of Dollars ). After the success of Yojimbo, Mifune would return to the character in three other films:  Sanjuro (which is fantastic), Zatoichi Meets Yojimbo (which is enjoyable), and finally Incident at Blood Pass (which is. . . okay). Check out my review for more. White Haired Witch —One of the most loved martial arts novels of all time was Baifa Monu Zhuan by Liang Yusheng. That work of fiction has been adapted many times, most notably in the cult classic The Bride with White Hair . Based on what I’ve read, White Haired Witch is closer to the original material of Yusheng’s book. However, White Haired Witch serves as proof that the more faithful adaptation is not always the better one. Read my full review at City on Fire.  Books I don’t have as many book recommendations to share this time around. This is partly due to the fact that I’ve been busy. . . and also because I recently read some books that I would not recommend. It’s generally considered unwise for authors to leave poor reviews for fellow authors. I understand why, so I've been trying to stick to that advice. So you know: I’m not likely to be posting any reviews for books I don’t like. Unless they’re classics. Maybe. Well, you know, I figure someone like Hemingway can take a punch.

Onto the good stuff... Okay so, the first recommendation is a book that everyone’s reading this Spring: The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins. The book is a puzzle with a few pieces missing, and it works because of how and when the author decides to reveal those pieces. I also really liked the shifting first-person POV storytelling. The Girl on the Train is an impressive debut and an enjoyable mystery. Is it okay to call it Hitchcockian? It’s Hitchcockian. Read my full review at Goodreads.  I also recently read Stephen King’s short story collection Just After Sunset . While it's not one of my favorite King collections, there are some great stories in here. My favorite from the collection is N . I would even go so far as to say that the book is worth picking up for this story alone. N is about the uncovered files of a psychologist that committed suicide and the patient that led him to such a dark place. The patient known only as ‘N’ is an obsessive compulsive that went off the rails after visiting a field that he believes is a thin spot between our world and the dark world beyond. N gets creepier and creepier as it goes along, finally coming to what I consider to be a perfect finale. I love this story. It’s excellent and I consider it to be among King’s most frightening works of horror ever. Read my full review of Just After Sunset on Goodreads. Comics In April I decided to try out Marvel Unlimited, an online comic book database. It’s a bit like Netflix or Kindle Unlimited – but for Marvel comics. I used to read Marvel comics a lot when I was younger (Spider-Man was my favorite at Marvel and Batman my favorite at DC), but man I sure did miss a lot of interesting storylines between then and now. I decided instead of sampling a bit of everything that I would instead try to read one of the big Marvel event storylines. Considering that the Marvel cinematic universe is heading in the direction of Civil War, I figured I’d start there.

The Marvel Civil War is an epic event that takes place after a team of superheroes accidentally cause a disaster which results in the deaths of hundreds of people. The government passes the Superhuman Registration Act into law so that all powered or costumed heroes can be governed and kept in check. Iron Man and others back the law, feeling that they need to be held accountable for their actions. Meanwhile, Captain America leads a resistance against the law, which brings the two sides into conflict with one another.

There is a central story written by Mark Millar, a companion piece called Front Line , and many of the individual superheroes had tie-ins to the Civil War conflict. With so much to read, I had to pick and choose. Here’s my thoughts on the stories I decided to read. . . Civil War – I enjoyed Mark Millar's Civil War book. There’s some cool action, interesting twists, and really good art. I guess I’ll never know if it works as well without the tie-ins, but as one big package it’s highly enjoyable.

The concept of a registration act leading to civil war amongst the costumed ranks is a cool idea for Marvel to do, and they handled the event with style. I liked that it was a more political Marvel story, sometimes with knowing nods to events in our history, now played out with capes and masks. And seeing heroes fight each other is cool because it gives fans a bit of something new, instead of just having them beat up on Doctor Doom all the time. I enjoyed the event and Millar's central story really works to hold it all together.

I do think that this particular story could've come to a more satisfying conclusion, though. While the final moments do hit home the ideas central to the story, it’s still a bit of a letdown. Still, the comic does forever alter the Marvel universe, so maybe I shouldn't be surprised that they limited the death toll in the final battle and pulled some punches. These are the heroes, after all.

But overall, I enjoyed myself. I haven’t read this many Marvel comics in years. It was fun. With the Marvel cinematic universe heading in the direction of Civil War, I’ll be curious to see how much has been altered and how much remains the same. Front Line Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 -- While all the heroes are beating each other up, Front Line makes the Civil War storyline into a political conspiracy thriller. It’s really cool, really well done.

One of my issues with the Civil War event is that many of the stories (including the central one by Millar) don’t exactly reach the most satisfying conclusion. Front Line is the exception. While the other hero tie-ins make way for the central story only to have Millar’s Civil War pull its punches at the end, Front Line sticks to its guns and comes to a satisfying, surprising finale.

If you decide to read Civil War, you should try to fit Front Line into your reading time. It’s worth it, because it makes all the other stories better, while also telling a cool story of its own.  The Amazing Spider-Man -- Out of all the superhero Marvel Civil War tie-ins, this is my favorite. I grew up with Spider-Man comics. Even though I missed out on many big storylines over the years, I kind of felt like I knew all the big Spider-Man stories and the hero had no surprises for me. Well, I was wrong.

So, in the Civil War saga, Peter Parker is friends with Tony Stark and follows him when the superhero registration act is passed into law. Peter puts on the suit and fights against his former allies, while dealing with an internal struggle about whether this is the right thing to do. Tony wants Peter to become an example to the superhero community. But is Tony asking for too much? Themes of loyalty and the moral questions about the value of the registration act are best explored in this story more than any other.

I really liked this one. One of the best comics in the Civil War event and one of the more memorable Spider-Man stories I’ve read. The Others:

Punisher: War Journal — The Punisher tries to join Captain America’s team, but he doesn’t exactly fit in because he keeps killing people. If Front Line is Civil War’s conspiracy thriller, and all the other heroes lend more action to the conflict, then Punisher should be considered Civil War’s dark comedy. Lots of fun and great art.

New Avengers – A mixed bag of loosely connected stories about heroes impacted by the registration act. The Luke Cage story is cool but mostly these feel like filler for the bigger Civil War arc.

Iron Man – Iron Man is seen as the antagonist in the Civil War event in a lot of ways. This comic lends some perspective, as we see it more from his POV.

Captain America —Much of Cap’s best story bits in the Civil War arc comes in Millar’s book and in Front Line Vol. 2. This has some good stuff, though, and the shadowy art is especially cool.

And there were many more, but these were the best of what I read. 

Other Recommendations Furious 7 : Or, the Importance of Not Taking Yourself Too Seriously and Just Having a Good Time.

Mortal Kombat X  is nasty good fun. I’ve always been a big fan of this game series. This might be the most technically impressive entry to date. I’m really liking it.

A Most Violent Year is a classy crime drama from last year that deserves a larger audience. Oscar Isaac and Jessica Chastain are great in the lead roles. Director JC Chandor is producing one great film after another, slowly becoming one of my favorite directors working today.

Predestination is a strange little sci-fi thriller with Ethan Hawke. Just when you think the time travel sub-genre has run out of ideas, something like this comes along and shows you there’s still so much potential to the concept. Best time travel film since Primer. Really weird at times, but it’s a puzzle that I enjoyed watching come together.

Oh, and did I mention It Follows is scary as hell?

It Follows is scary as hell.

I think that’s it for now. . .

NEXT TIME : I will hopefully have more book recommendations! I also have some cool cult classic movies on my slate, so keep checking cityonfire.com for future reviews. And again, if any of these titles sound cool to you, I’d appreciate you clicking the links provided. Thanks!

In the coming weeks I will have some announcements about my next books (including the sequel to Death's Good Intentions ) so keep checking back.

Until then! 

Take care.

It Follows and Horror That Scares Me

I recently saw David Robert Mitchell’s new horror film It Follows.

I think I love this film. It’s unique, weird, cool, disturbing, and has moments of holy shit terror. Saw it by myself in an empty theatre so I felt completely fine with screaming, “No!!” whenever I damn well pleased. In fact, I think that might be the best way to view the film. So, if you go to see it but find that there are others also in the theatre, kindly ask them to leave. I’m sure they will understand.

It Follows is about a sexually transmitted curse that finds its way to a young woman. She’s told that a thing that can look like anyone it chooses will follow her to the ends of the earth. Sometimes it’ll look like someone you know, sometimes it’ll look like a horrifying stranger. It’s not fast, but it never stops, it’s always out there, always following you. It means to kill the girl and her only way to get rid of the curse is to pass it on, but of course it’s never that easy.

The story is a unique blend urban legend curses, the terror of disease, plus loads of paranoia, madness, all with a backdrop of urban decay. The young cast is really good, especially the lead Maika Monroe. And I love the film’s score by Disasterpeace, which is a blend of John Carpenter, Blade Runner, and Trent Reznor. It’s one of my favorite film scores in a long time.


Amazon.com Widgets
And oh yeah, I’m forgetting perhaps the most important thing: It Follows scared the hell out of me.

I think different kinds of horror films scare different people. Person A thinks jump scares are what make a horror film successful. Person B thinks it’s the blood and gore. Person C says it’s the disturbing themes. Person D doesn't like clowns. Person E, F, G, H, I, J, K… they all got their something.

Me? I’m most frightened by menacing camerawork, mood, and the director’s ability to build an overwhelming sense of dread. Cinema of unease.

CGI and fast-cutting edits do a disservice to most horror films, in my opinion. CGI may help make certain things come alive, but at least some part of your brain knows the thing isn’t really there, that you’re looking at a movie trick. Even though fake blood is also a trick, the mind accepts it in a different way because it’s clearly in camera. Similarly, fast cuts can make for a visceral, unpleasant horror experience, but they don’t build a sense of dread or deliver the creeps. I like it more when the director lets the camera linger there and makes everything in frame as real as possible. I get lost in the film, like the visuals have taken me somewhere I’d rather not be. That moment when I get lost, like I’m trapped there in the box the camera has made for the audience, that’s when my barriers fall away just enough to get the bejesus scared out of me.

Many of the horror films that scared me the most operate this way. Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining has its long, menacing steadycam shots that go through the halls of the Overlook. When the camera follows little Danny into a hall and spots the girls in blue, I’m always shaken up when the film assaults you with the sight of their dead bodies and all the blood. Kiyoshi Kurosawa films in a similar fashion. Films like Cure, Pulse, and Charisma have an ominous feel to them, which is the result of camerawork, music, lighting, and knowing when to cut to the next shot and when to let the scene linger. He conjures up dread in almost every scene. Other films like Alien, The Blair Witch Project, The Ring, The Exorcist, The Descent, and John Carpenter’s Halloween, they all scare me because the visuals and sound create an air of menace that other horror films don’t often have the patience for. As such, they’re some of my favorite horror films. Sure, rewatching them softens the scares, but I still return to them often because I admire the craft.

It Follows has a perfectly fine screenplay, but the film reaches modern classic status because of its threatening cinematography and its amazing score. Director Mitchell knows he has to be patient to set the hook before delivering the biggest scares. It pays off, and we get some truly great scenes. This sort of movie may not frighten everyone – those in need of blood and gore will find little to like here – but for those who like creepy, tense horror, It Follows is pretty great.

Reviews & Recommendations: January and February 2015

Everyone’s a critic. Including me! I've been writing reviews for books, games, and movies off and on for a long time now. Lately I've found that I actually kind of enjoy writing reviews and will be doing more of them in the future. So, to give the blog a bit more activity I thought I would begin cross-posting or sharing links to my reviews here every now and then. This first post will be a review roundup of the first two months of the year (with some spillover from 2014 just to add more content). . . and because I don’t review everything but I still want to pass on a good word about stuff that deserves some attention, I’ll be sharing some general recommendations, too.

If you're interested in purchasing any of the books or films featured here, I'd appreciate you clicking the corresponding artwork which has an Amazon affiliate link to the product. Thanks! 

Books & Comics

Wool by Hugh Howey – I’d been hearing about this book for a long time and maybe some of the hype delayed my eagerness to check it out for whatever reason. Well, it lives up to the hype, my friends. A great piece of post-apocalyptic sci-fi. It's very, very cool. Check out my (short) review at Goodreads.

Atlanta Burns by Chuck Wendig – Gritty, tough YA crime thriller. It’s not often a pleasant experience, but it’s well-written and full of interesting characters. The lead character Atlanta Burns is one of my new favorite heroines. My review.

Drood by Dan Simmons – Listened to this as an audiobook. It’s a strange, dark tale of obsession and madness with Charles Dickens as one of the lead characters. Think Amadeus meets Nosferatu and you're pretty close to what to expect from this one. I was also highly impressed by the audiobook’s narrator Simon Prebble – great performance. My review at Goodreads.

Uzumaki Vol. 1 by Junji Ito – This one’s a manga, a Japanese comic book. It’s so strange. It's about a town cursed by spirals -- spirals are everywhere, don't you know?! The twisting shapes cause insanity and all sorts of bizarre body transformations. I don’t believe the book is always successful at what it tries to do, but the imagery and ideas present here are truly unforgettable. I hope to read Vol. 2 soon. My review.

Godzilla: Cataclysm by Cullen Bunn & Dave Wachter – So, if you know me at all, you might know I’m a Godzilla fan. And as a fan, I’m always happy to check out new stories with my favorite characters/monsters. Godzilla: Cataclysm actually got me a bit worried when it was announced last year... for purely selfish reasons, you understand. Cataclysm is a post-apocalyptic Godzilla comic that was set to release at around the same time I was hoping to launch my post-apocalyptic kaiju novel. Well, my novel’s still not available (soon!), and the Godzilla: Cataclysm comic has released its final issues. I'm slow. But you know, I gotta say I really liked this graphic novel. It’s dark and menacing and it brings new ideas to the Godzilla series (plus it gives Biollante her best role since the creature's original film). I’m also relieved to note that it’s not too terribly similar to my novel – the basic concept is the same (monsters had a hand in destroying the world), but the ideas and themes are different. I suspect that this rambling means nothing to anyone but me, but hey, thought I’d share. Anyway, the graphic novel is really good and one of the better Godzilla comics released by IDW. The collection will be available as a trade paperback in late March. Here’s my review at Goodreads.

Godzilla: Legends by various writers and artists – More Godzilla! This is an anthology of single issue Godzilla comics, each focusing on a different kaiju from the Toho roster. And like most anthologies, Legends is very hit and miss. Some really good stories, and some not so hot. My review.

Landline by Rainbow Rowell – This is so not my type of book – a romantic comedy of sorts with a magic telephone at the center of it all – but I decided to check it out based on the love it was getting over at Goodreads. And what do you know? I liked it. I really liked it. Fantastic dialogue, fully realized characters, and an interesting little story. I still prefer books from other genres, but a change of pace never hurt anybody. Here’s my review.

Revival by Stephen King – I feel like Revival is a victim of misrepresentation. The novel has its moments of horror – and it has King’s name on the cover – but this isn’t a horror novel. Not really. It’s a dark character drama with themes of obsession and the dangers of a curious mind. It’s not one of my favorite Stephen King novels, but I enjoyed the read. My review at Goodreads. Film

Recently I began writing reviews for the website cityonfire.com. City on Fire specializes in Asian action films, something I've always been interested in since being a big fan of Jackie Chan as a kid and growing up into a fan of films by masters like Akira Kurosawa, Shinya Tsukamoto, and John Woo. I’m enjoying the chance to share some thoughts on films I like – both old and new – and helping film fans discover movies and filmmakers that might otherwise go overlooked by Western audiences.

Again, if you're interested in buying any of these films, just click the posters/cover art for links to Amazon. A Colt is My Passport,  a film by Takashi Nomura – An underrated gem of the Japanese crime genre. The plot is fairly basic -- hitman on the run from rivals is sold out by his own boss -- but everything works marvelously. The energetic finale is one of the coolest shootouts ever filmed. Read my full review at City on Fire.

Snowpiercer, a film by Joon-ho Bong – I wrote this review a while ago, but it’s an awesome movie deserving of your attention. . . and I’m rather proud of my review for whatever reason. After a new ice age destroys the world, the last living humans survive on a train that rides across the frozen old world. It's an interesting look at class warfare, filled with offbeat moments and some wonderfully weird characters. Tilda Swinton is amazing in this movie. Check out Snowpiercer and check out my review.

Tokyo Drifter, a film by Seijun Suzuki – Seijun Suzuki is a one of a kind director. He took this cookie cutter script about an ex-yakuza on the run and turned it into one of the most colorful and original films of the genre. It’s a total blast. Check out my review.

Brotherhood of Blades, a film by Yang Lu – Here’s a surprising Chinese martial arts noir. The plot could easily be transplanted into a New York-based film noir about corrupt cops, hitmen, and doomed romances. But with Brotherhood of Blades you also get kung fu. I’m not often impressed by many recent Chinese films, but this one’s an exception. Here’s my review.

The Pirates, a film by Seok-hoon Lee – Somebody in South Korea watched all those Pirates of the Caribbean movies and thought they’d try their hand at it. The result is largely successful: both funny and adventurous. It’s not a movie for deep thinkers – and the CGI whale at the center of the story gets more banged up than some viewers would like – but for the most part it can be a lot of fun. Fans of Pirates of the Caribbean should consider giving it a look. My review.

Bushido Man, a film by Takanori Tsujimoto -- A silly martial arts film where the hero is taught that in order to defeat his enemy, he must first eat like his enemy. It gets pretty wild at the end. Weird but enjoyable little movie. My review.

Tekken 2: Kazuya’s Revenge, a film by Wych Kaos – One of the worst videogame adaptations ever? Yeah, pretty much. You can read why here.

Recommendations & Stuff

Have you seen Boyhood ? No? Then you’re doing it WRONG. Watch Boyhood.

What about Whiplash ? You didn’t see that either? The hell? You should. Great movie.

Selma is brilliant. So unfairly overlooked at the Oscars this year. It’s an important and beautifully made film. I was going in expecting a by-the-book kind of retelling of the events, but it’s a much more somber piece than that, and director Ava DuVernay films it in an interesting way. I love this movie.

Let’s see. . .

Oh! Two very different films about the creative process that all creative types should consider giving a look: The Kingdom of Dreams and Madness and 20,000 Days on Earth . Kingdom is about Hayao Miyazaki and the making of his final film The Wind Rises. It’s perhaps the warmest, most honest behind-the-scenes look at filmmaking I’ve ever seen. Fans of Studio Ghibli should definitely check this out, but I think it should appeal to film buffs and artists of all sorts. 20,000 Days on Earth is a stylized documentary about musician Nick Cave’s creative process. I think it’s brilliant and really quite inspiring.

I think that’s it for today. Depending on how this goes and whether I like it, I may begin doing this more regularly. . . or never again! We’ll see. Even if reviews don’t become a featured thing on this blog, I will continue writing them regardless. So, send me a friend request on Goodreads to keep up with my book reviews, and if you're into international action cinema then keep checking City on Fire for more reviews by me and other writers. 

Until next time!

-- Kyle

Death's Good Intentions ebook available everywhere. Again.

After three months as a Kindle exclusive, the ebook of Death’s Good Intentions is now available at all major online booksellers.

If you've been interested in the book but didn't want to go with Amazon, you now have a few more choices...

Barnes & Noble Nook

iTunes

Kobo

Smashwords

Google Play

. . . and of course it still remains available from Amazon.

If I have overlooked your favorite online bookstore, please let me know!

So, was the Kindle Select exclusivity worth it for those extra perks? . . . No, not really. I mean, it’s true that probably 75% of sales come from Amazon, but exclusivity sucks. Also, I hate that word. Exclusivity. I just do. 

Really though, choice is an important thing, and you shouldn’t be forced to go to Amazon if you want to read an author’s books. . . On that same note, I believe authors shouldn't be forced to go exclusively with Amazon in order to get some of the 'perks' like Kindle Unlimited and the occasional free day.

Will I do Kindle Select again? . . . Not with this book or any other in the End of the World series, no. I’m not ruling out a return to Kindle Select with an unrelated book, though, if only because Kindle Unlimited still has a chance of taking off. Also, there’s a chance that a future anthology I might be involved with goes with Kindle Select and I don’t wanna look like an ass by saying I’d never do it again, heh. Never say never!

So yeah, just wanted to give you all a heads-up and let you know that the book is available everywhere once again. Please consider giving it a look!

Take care!

-- Kyle