Reading anything?

[BoyScoutKevin]

Ye-es!
6 of 1 in various formats

Charles Todd
(mother and son writing team)
American
The Gate Keeper
20th in the Ian Rutledge series
9 more fiction in 1 more series + 2 stand-alones
Hero: Brit
Place: U.K.
Time: 1920s


Joe R. Lansdale
American
award winner
Jack Rabbit Smile
11th in the Hap and Leonard series
15 more stand-alones + 3 short story collections
Heroes: Caucasian and Afro-American
Place: Texas
Time: Present

And if you'd rather see it, then read it. The book series is also a TV series.


graphic novel
Dead Weight :
Murder at Camp Bloom


Richard Hull
(i.e. Richard Henry Sampson)
Brit
The Murder of My Aunt
with an intro. by Martin Edwards
in the British Library Crime Classic series
1st published in 1934
Republished 2018
Hero: Welsh
Place: Wales (U.K.)
Time: 1930s


Penny Richards
American
Murder Will Speak
3rd in the Lilly Long series
Heroine: American
Place: Illinois and Texas
Time: 1880s


graphic novel
The Comic Book Story of Baseball :
the Heroes, the Hustlers, and History-making Swings (and Misses) of America's National Pastime

from the beginnings of its origins in the 11th century to 2016.


Naomi Hirahara
Japanese-American
award winner
Hiroshima Boy
7th in the Mas Arai series
2 more fiction in 1 more series + 5 non-fiction + 1 children's book
Hero: Japanese ex-pat
Place: Japan
Time: Present


Next time: another special report

[BoyScoutKevin]

Ye-es!

graphic novel
Et Tu, Brute :
Deaths of the Roman Emperors

Between 14 A.D. and the death of Augustus Caesar and 491 A.D. and the death of Romulus Augustulus, inclusive, there were 97 Roman emperors.

The longest reign was 25 years.
The shortest reign was for less than an year for many of the Roman emperors.
And the average reign was for 5 years.

Of the Roman emperors . . .
44 were murdered (45.36%)
25 died of natural causes (25.77%)
07 were killed in battle (7.22%)
06 died in an accident (6.19%)
06 committed suicide (6.19%)
04 deaths were unknown (4.12%)
03 were executed (3.09%)
02 were stoned to death (2.06%)
97 total (100%) or thereabouts

Next time: and a half dozen of the other in various formats

[Svengoolie 3]

The grand design by hawking.

[FatFreddysCat]

Red: My Uncensored Life in Rock by Sammy Hagar

[BoyScoutKevin]

Ye-es!
And a half dozen more in various formats.

Joe R. Lansdale and Kasey Lansdale
(father and daughter writing duo)
Americans
Terror is Our Business :
Dana Roberts' Casebook of Horrors
a short story collection of 7 short stories published between 2011 and 2018


Cara Hunter
Brit
1st novelist
Close to Home
1st in the DI Adam Fawley series
Hero: Brit
Place: Oxfordshire (U.K.)
Time: Present


Blood on the Tracks :
Railway Mysteries
edited and introduced by Martin Edwards
part of the British Library Crime Classics series
15 stories published between 1898 and the 1950s


Jim DeFelice
American
West Like Lightning :
the Brief Legendary Ride of the Pony Exoress
4 more non-fiction
And if you'd rather see it, then read it, there is the film The Pony Exoress and the TV series The Young Riders. Though, I'd not vouch for the accuracy of neither.


Paul Collins
Aussie
Absolute Power :
How the Pope Became the Most Influential man in the World
3 more non-fiction


Mark A. Latham
Brit
Sherlock Holmes :
the Red Tower
13th in the Holmes series by 6 authors and the 2nd by this author.
Hero: Brit
Place: U.K.
Time: 1890s

Next time: maybe another special report

[BoyScoutKevin]

Ye-es!
6 of 1 in various formats

Jim DeFelice
American
West Like Lightning :
the Brief Legendary Ride of the Pony Express
4 more non-fiction

And if you'd rather see it, then read it, there is the film The Pony Express and the TV series Young Riders.


Karen Lee Street
American ex-pat
Edgar Allan Poe and the Jewel of Paris
2nd in the Poe and Dupin series
Heroes: American and French
Places: Pennsylvania (U.S.) and Maryland (U.S.)
Time: 1840s


Lindsay Davis
Brit
Pandora's Boy
6th in the Flavia Albia series
20 more fiction in 1 more series + 7 stand-alones
Heroine: Romanized Brit
Place: Rome
Time: 1st century A.D.


Didier Ghez
American
award winner
They Drew as They Pleased :
the Hidden Art of Disney's mid-Century Era :
the 1950s and 1960s
4th in the series


Rob McCarthy
Brit
A Handful of Ashes
2nd in the Dr. Harry Kent series
Hero: Brit
Place: U.K.
Time: 2010s


Al Roker
Afro-American (and yes, that Al Roker)
award winner
Ruthless Tide :
the Heroes and the Villains of the Johnstown Flood, America's Astonishing Gilded Age Disaster
1 more non-fiction


Elly Griffiths
Brit
award winner
The Dark Angel
10th in the Ruth Galloway series
4 more fiction in 1 more series
Heroine: Brit
Place: U.K. and Italy
Time: 2010s

Next time: and a half dozen more or more in various formats

[indianasmith]

THE INVASION OF CANADA: 1812-13 by Pierre Berton

Well-written, rich in detail, and colorful in style, this account of America's disastrous attempt to seize control of British North America during the first year of the War of 1812 is an excellent addition to any library!

[BoyScoutKevin]

Ye-es!
Another 6 of 1 in various formats.

graphic novel
I Am Gandhi :
a Graphic Biography of a Hero
illustrations by 25 different illustrators
part of the Ordinary People Change the World series


graphic novel
The Beatles Yellow Submarine
from song to animated film to graphic novel


graphic novel
Lumber Janes
v.9 On a Roll
collecting chapters #33-36


graphic novel
Damnation : the Complete Collection

featuring . . .
Doctor Strange -- Ghost Rider -- Iron Fist -- Scarlet Spider

with cameos by . . .
Wong -- MoonKnight -- Mephisto -- Manthing -- Elsa Bloodstone -- Doctor Voodoo -- Blade

and published between May 11, 2018 - June 12, 2018


Alan Melville
Brit
Weekend at Thrackley
part of the British Library Crime Classic Series
1st novel
1st published 1934
republished 2018
Hero: Brit
Place: U.K.
Time: 1930s
If you'd rather see it, then read it. It was filmed in the 1930's as Hot Ice, then refilmed in the 1950's under the novel's title.


E. C. R. Lorac
(i.e. Edith Carolre Rivett)
Brit
Fire in the Thatch :
a Devon Mystery
British Library Crime Classics series
Originally published in 1946
Republished 2018
Hero: Brit
Place: Devonshire (U.K.)
Time: 1940s


Barbara Hambly
American
Cold Bayou
8th in the Benjamin January series
5 more ficttion in 1 more series
Hero: a free man of color
Place: Louisiana (U.S.)
Time: 1830s

Next time: a special report

[ER]

THE INVASION OF CANADA: 1812-13 by Pierre Berton

Well-written, rich in detail, and colorful in style, this account of America's disastrous attempt to seize control of British North America during the first year of the War of 1812 is an excellent addition to any library!

Something I noticed living in Maine, Canadians were polite but if you messed with them to the point they got mad, they'd suddenly want to freaking kill you out of all proportion to the situation. Bet that's what happened back then, we invaded so they charged in waving hockey sticks and throwing hot poutine, hopped up on legal marijuana and fearless of wounds because all that winter and government-managed health care left them welcoming death.

[indianasmith]

CITY OF ENDLESS NIGHT by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child

This is the latest entry in the Pendergast series by these remarkable authors, featuring the one and only Special Agent Aloysius Pendergast, eccentric FBI agent and all around man of mystery.  I was so engrossed I devoured the entire novel in three hours.  If you  haven't read any of these, I highly recommend them.  Pendergast was first introduced in THE RELIC over 20 years ago, but since then the agent has been the subject of around fifteen novels, all of them first rate.  Check them out!

[ER]

My husband bought me a rare pre-publication copy of a 1978 book I have read before in a markedly different version, called The Facts in the Case of EA Poe which was ultimately printed in final form in 1979

It is a novel about a pedophiliac 1970s eccentric who shuns most of the trappings of the modern world and dwells in a 19th century house lighted with candles, as he tries to live out the life of Edgar Allan Poe in contemporary times.

A prissy, oddly germ-phobic man with clear mental peculiarities bordering on insanity, Earnest Albert Pons visits the psychologist he is ordered by the court to see, and either pours his soul out or proves a classic unreliable narrator, depending on your take, telling of his sexual desires for a young girl who may or may not be his cousin, his nightmare and phobias, his obsession with Poe and Poe's death (and his own death), and his efforts to resist believing himself Poe's reincarnation, as some suggest to him he might be.  

While in the course of the plot Pons was based on Poe, he actually reminded me more of Lovecraft with his pretensions of gentility, his Anglophilia, his bigotries, his fanciful outlook on a world he tried to believe was a thin shell over an invisible realm filled with monsters.

Through the flow of the book is the question of how far one can go in trusting what Pons says, is he serious in his way of living, or is he a crafty monster hoping to build an insanity defense up should he ever be caught acting upon his sexual interest in young girls. There is also the question of possession or imitation, and whether a sane man can live in an insane way.

I have to say this version, which clearly represents an earlier draft of the final work the world saw in 1979, is a lot more twisted and dark than the book I read years ago.

[BoyScoutKevin]

We'll put off the special report to next time. Till then . . . a half dozen more in various formats.

Martin Walker
Brit ex-pat
A Taste for Vengance
11th in the Bruno, Chief of Police series
Hero: French
Place: France
Time: Present


Leanda de Lisle
Brit
The White King :
Charles I, Traitor, Murderer, Martyr
3 more non fiction


graphic novel
Ant-man and the Wasp :
Prequel


graphic novel
The Astonishing Ant-man :
the Complete Collection


graphic novel
Ant-man and the Wasp :
Adventures

graphic novel
The Astonishing Ant-man

Best posse
Ant-man's with . . .
The Beatle
Giantman
Grizz
Hijacker
The Magician
Ms. Thing
Smith
The Voice
Whirlwind

Best family group
House of M with . . .
Grandfather: Magneto
Children: the Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver
Grandchildren: Wiccan and Speed

Best friends
Ms. Marvel's (Kamala Khan)
Supposedly, she is to get her own series, either live action or animated, on Disney+.

Best youth group
Young Avengers with . . .
Wiccan
Miss America Chavez
Marvel Boy
Kid Loki
Kate "Hawkeye" Bishop
Hulking

[BoyScoutKevin]

Ye-es!
with a special report on . . .

Marvel's Encyclopedia

featuring almost 900 Marvel comic book characters as seen in Marvel comics published between 1937 and 2019.

Each character gets anywhere from a sixth of a page to a 2-page spread.

Each character also gets . . .

their real name -- occupation -- base -- heighth -- weight -- color of eyes -- color of hair -- and 1st appearance.

Some also get . . .

special powers/abilities -- essential storylines -- allies -- and foes.

The Good
excluding nationality, the diversity of the characters.

sexually -- religiously -- racially -- geographically,

that it is up to date.

The Bad
the lack of other nationalities among the characters, as almost all of them, if from Earth, are Americans.

No Age
given, but from what I know, and the way the characters are depicted in the book, there are some 2 dozen characters that are teens, or 13-19, or 2.69% and almost a half dozen characters that are pre-teens, or 01-12, or 0.78%

it is incomplete. Even with almost 900 characters, if one is familiar with Marvel comics, not all the characters that have appeared in them, are listed in the encyclopedia.

The Ugly Surprise
or maybe not so ugly, but a surprise to me. Captain America was not the 1st Marvel character to appear in comic books. The 1st Marvel character to appear in comic books was Namor, who made his appearance some 2 years ere Captain America.

Next time: 6 of 1 in various formats.

[ER]

I was feeling down this weekend after my dog died and I thought, you know, I need a book to make me feel even worse, so I re-re-re-read former Brat Packer Jay McInerney's magnum opus of disaster, Story of my Life, which I first read in college in order to find comfort in the knowledge that there actually were girls out there even more messed up than me, since I at least didn't do drugs and never routinely had sex with multiple men so I could later serially scam them out of abortion money.

What I did not know then and wouldn't for many years was this was not a novel so much as a roman a clef, and that the main character would later become infamous for having a daughter with a Presidential candidate whose faithful wife was dying of cancer. A certain Rielle Hunter, you might remember?  Yes, this is the story of her life!

Still a good book if you like to grit your teeth and wince at a self-authored train wreck of a life, lived on the Preppie East Coast circa 1987.

[pennywise37]

firstly i'm sorry to hear that your dog died i'm not an animal person but we had a horse that we had to put down way back i think it was in (2000) ? she had bad

intestines sadly. so we were forced to put her down. like i said i'm not really much of an animal person but we had that horse since i was baby and i do miss her too. but i went outside and said goodbye to her the night before. anyways so i get it and i hope that book helped or another book, the secret is don't listen to music you know that will depress the living hell out of you.  look for more upbeat music and that might help ya a bit at least, anyways as for books

i've been no joke reading Castle Roogna by Piers Anthony, i wish i was making this up i belong to a stephen King fan site of sorts and looking at old posts of mine i started that feb of last year!  and since than i've picked it up a number of times and read more of it, but last night i picked it up and i only had 3 chapters left well i read 2 chapters of it and now i'm gonna finally finish it tonight.

now you may wonder is the book that bad? the answer is no it isn't if you enjoy him as an author like i do this is actually my i think 3rd time reading it and the reason is i started other books and this you may think i'm weird on this but that's okay because i myself think it's weird as well, as long as i remember when i want to read a book i have to be in the mood for it, if i'm in the mood for a horror novel it has to be am i in the mood for a king novel? if so what era am i in the mood for? what i do i can pick 30 books up and when one grips me if i start to read it that's the one i read and the same goes for music as well and movies, tv shows etc.. i'm weird like that i guess lol someone posted an old interview on you tube of Piers Anthony and the guy RARELY if ever gives them and he hasn't really giving one in a long time cause in recent years his wife has been ill so he's 85 now so he spends his time taking care of her and the chores around the house and writing as well.

how i do i know? well on his website he does a newsletter of sorts where he talks about his life and so on and tells his fans about it. so when i saw someone post it i nearly fell out of my chair, the video is apparently from (1990) so as you can see it's an old one i may start the next Xanth book tonight i dunno just yet.