Monkey droppings - a trio of pleasures both subtle and gross, and not for the timid

On today's agenda, a triumvirate of testaments to creativity. And zombies. Lots and lots of zombies.




The Stress of Her Regard
by Tim Powers

For me, the fantasy genre has always been a mixed bag of pleasures. For every tasty chocolate truffle of pure imagination (Lev Grossman's exemplary The Magicians, for instance), there are three or four of the cheap Hallowe'en candy no one likes, the post-Tolkien 'orcs and trolls' variety a la Ed Greenwood, wherein each novel reads like a particularly dense...