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This post written by Clint Varney the Vampyre, or, The Feast of Blood
by James Malcolm Rymer (or possibly Thomas Preskett Prest)
[cover name=varneythevampyre]
What do you do if you have read all the popular vampire books and still want more? You might want to check these lists from Reading Rants or The Monster Librarian. However, if you consider yourself a fairly good reader, you don’t mind old-fashioned writing (like from the 1800s), and you want to learn more about the history of vampire literature, you might want to give an old-school vampire story a try.
Varney the Vampyre was written in the 1840s, about 50 years before Dracula. It tells the story of Sir Francis Varney, a vampire who isn’t all bad. Yeah, every so often he will sneak into a young woman’s room and drink some of her blood, but he doesn’t enjoy it. Okay, well, maybe he does, but not a lot. In fact, he often feels sorry for his victims, and he tries to help them out somehow. On the other hand, Varney is kind of unpredictable, and does kill a few people because they have stuff he wants.
Varney the Vampyre is such a long and strange book that it’s kind of hard to summarize. It starts out like a classic vampire tale, where the vampire breaks into a woman’s room in the middle of the night and sucks her blood. This poor woman is Flora Bannerworth, a member of the English aristocracy. The Bannerworth family owns a lovely mansion and has a few servants, but they are about out of money and are occasionally worried about having to sell Bannerworth Hall and move somewhere cheaper. We’ve got a fancy, old building, a helpless woman, and a blood-sucking fiend. Sounds like Dracula, but it’s not. Not even close.
The writing in the first chapter is just awful, and I was really not looking forward to reading all 800 pages. It got a little bit better in the second chapter, but I was still a little worried about finishing it. Fortunately, things improved a lot in Chapter 4, where the novel first shows a sense of humor. Flora’s brother Henry has figured out that they are being haunted by a vampire, but he wants to keep the whole thing a secret. On his way in to town, every single person he meets says something like, “Hello there, Mr. Bannerworth. How’s the vampyre?” Everybody.
Then, a few chapters later, the vampire is after Flora again. This time, though, she whips out a pistol and shoots him! We never find out how Flora learned to shoot, but she is pretty good with a gun. Unfortunately, Flora is never quite this cool again, and most of the other women in the story are either helpless victims, second-class citizens, or dishonest schemers, but that’s not uncommon for this time period.
Then we meet Admiral Bell and his servant/friend/shipmate/nemesis Jack Pringle. They both spew stereotypical sailor nonsense (like “shiver my timbers” or “you may give the devil a clear berth, and get into heaven’s straits, with a flowing sheet, provided you don’t, towards the end of the voyage, make any lubberly blunders”) and swear about as much as anyone can in this kind of story. Jack and the Admiral are always fighting with each other and always making up, and somehow they manage to be genuinely funny.
At some point, the Bannerworths realize that Varney isn’t really interested in sucking blood. He wants their house, for some reason. Quite a few things happen after that, and, while I don’t want to spoil anything, Varney ends up spending a few days as Flora’s house guest. Yeah, this is different.
About the first 50 chapters (out of 237) deal with Varney and the Bannerworth family. Basically, that’s a whole regular vampire novel. Then Varney vanishes, and the action moves about 25 miles away. We get another 25 chapters of a story that sort of involves vampires, and sort of involves the Bannerworth family, but we don’t see Varney much until near the end. Then the action moves to London, and again, we don’t see Varney or any of the other “regular” characters until the very end. After that, we get a bunch of short stories about Varney that almost always end with something bad happening to him.
Varney the Vampyre has its flaws. For a start, the writing is really uneven. It bounces from good to bad to so-bad-it’s-good. There are also a lot of subplots that never get resolved and a lot of details that get forgotten. What ever happened with that Quaker who was living on the Dearbrook estate? Why was Marmaduke Bannerworth’s coffin empty? For that matter, wasn’t Marmaduke originally named Runnagate in Chapter 2? Why did George Bannerworth just disappear from the novel? Well, the author was writing it pretty quickly, and apparently he was also busy writing nine other stories at the same time! Fortunately, this got better as I read more of the book. I don’t think the writing got better. I think I just got used to it.
Another problem is that the author was paid by the word, so he often tries to use a whole paragraph when a single sentence would do. Even worse, though, is that sometimes the characters will sit down and tell each other little stories that have nothing at all to do with the novel. Actually, that’s not the worst part. The worst part is when Varney himself decides to read a story because he has an hour to wait and nothing to do, and we have to read exactly what Varney reads.
I mentioned before that the story has a sense of humor. However, since it was written in the middle of the 19th century, there are some things that the author thought were funny that are actually kind of racist, or are otherwise not okay anymore. Fortunately, there aren’t very many of these.
However, the story has its good points, too. Some of the writing is really good: Varney has some really excellent lines when he’s messing with people, for example, and every so often there is a really nice description of a place or an event. There is some good humor, too. Varney can be snarky when he wants to, and the author does a good job of showing the little ways in which ordinary people suck. Admiral Bell and Jack Pringle are just hilarious, too. Also, at one point, one of the characters sits down and reads a really awful vampire novel.
The author does a really fantastic job with some of the characters. It took me about five lines to get a good picture of Mr. Marchdale, for example, and the more I read, the more right that image seemed. I was also really impressed by Admiral Bell and Jack Pringle. While they are the zany comic relief, they are also real people, and we eventually get to see their serious sides. I think they are my favorite characters.
How can I sum up this book? It’s not great writing. It’s not even great that great a vampire story. When pretentious professors of literature say that popular books are bad because those authors write for money rather than for Art, this is what they are thinking about. Still, I actually enjoyed most of the book, and it’s an interesting piece of vampire literary history. I can’t recommend it to everyone, but if you really want to learn more about early vampire fiction and aren’t scared off by the thought of 237 chapters, give it a try.
So how does Varney compare with the Hollywood vampire stereotype?
- Drinking Blood [checkmark] Although Varney doesn’t always bite the neck. Sometimes he goes for the arm.
- Has Fangs [checkmark] Actually, Varney may be the first vampire in literature to have fangs.
- Vampires Spread by Biting [checkmark] Apparently you can also become a vampire if you are a really bad person.
- Amazingly Strong [checkmark] Varney may be the first vampire in literature to have amazing strength.
- Unkillable [xmark] Varney actually gets killed a lot. I think he is shot to death five or six times, at least. He also gets stabbed by a sword once and drowned twice. However, moonlight brings him back.
- Weak Against Wooden Stakes [xmark] Well, they will work, but they aren’t any better than a sword or a gun. However, at several points, drunken mobs try to stake people they think are vampires, and one vampire is actually killed by a stake through the heart.
- Weak Against Sunlight [xmark] Varney doesn’t really enjoy sleep, since he has nightmares, so he is often out at night, but he’s also up during the day. It’s easier to scam people during the day, usually.
- Must be Invited In [xmark] Varney is polite, but he doesn’t actually need your permission to enter your house.
- Weak Against Flowing Water [xmark]
- Weak Against Holy Symbols [xmark] Actually, Varney hangs out with a priest for a while, and he breaks into a church.
- Weak Against Garlic [xmark]
- Get Confused at Crossroads [xmark] However, one drunken mob does try to bury a vampire they’ve staked at a crossroads. Varney helps out, and he seems just fine.
- No Reflection in Mirrors [xmark] Varney specifically mentions seeing himself in a mirror. Of course, he might be lying.
- No Heartbeat/Breath/Blood/Temperature/Other Signs of Life [xmark] Varney has all the signs of life, except that he won’t stay dead and he doesn’t need to eat or drink (except blood).
- Pale, Corpse-like Appearance [checkmark] This might be because Varney was dead for two years before he came back as a vampire. Or he might be lying.
- Doesn’t Age [checkmark] We don’t know how old Varney is, but the story covers at least 30 or 40 years, and he never seems to get older.
- Changes Shape [xmark] The best Varney can do is put on a disguise. He does that a lot.
- Flight [xmark] Varney can jump pretty high, but that’s probably because he has supernatural strength.
- Wall Crawling [xmark]
- Hypnotic Powers [checkmark] As long as Varney can stare at his victim, she can’t move or scream. Of course, he has trouble doing this and actually biting her at the same time. Varney may be the first vampire in literature to have this power.
- Sleeps in a Coffin [xmark] Varney likes his beds to be aired out and clean.
- Wealthy [xmark] [checkmark] Sometimes Varney has lots of money, and sometimes he doesn’t. Usually he does, though.
How about some of the more modern trends?
- Sophisticated and Elegant [checkmark] Varney has a sense of style and he likes the finer things in life. He can really put on the charm when he needs, too.
- Angsty [checkmark] You don’t see it at first, but Varney really isn’t happy as a vampire. He’d rather be dead for real. He doesn’t spend a whole lot of time whining about it, though.
- Dark and Brooding [xmark]
- Really Just Misunderstood [xmark] [checkmark] Varney is somewhat misunderstood, he really does need somebody to talk to, and he occasionally goes out of his way to do good things for people, but he’s not a good person. Still, Varney may be the first somewhat-sympathetic vampire in literature.
- A Sucker for Love [xmark] Varney’s not going to fall in love with the first person who tries to stake him. He never falls in love with anyone in the story, although he does respect Flora and a few other people. He also wants to get married, although we’re not sure why. It’s clearly not for love, though.
- Looks Young and Sexy [xmark] Varney is late middle-aged, pale, and ugly.
- Fluid Sexuality [xmark] Varney is never sexually attracted to anyone in the story.
You can read some commentary on this blog. At five chapters a month, the blog should get through all 237 chapters in just under four years.
You can also check out a new graphic adaptation. Unfortunately, at their current pace of one chapter in two months, they will be done some time in 2050.
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Where to Find It
You can read the whole thing online thanks to the University of Virginia’s Electronic Text Center. There are a few typos in this edition, but then, there were some pretty serious typos in the original printing.
[linkplus name=”Varney the Vampyre” url=”http://csul.iii.com/search/t?SEARCH=varney+the+vampyre” series=false cchasone=false]
[librarydate]
This post written by Clint Yotsuba&!
by Kiyohiko Azuma
[cover name=yotsubato]
Yotsuba is one of those kids who is always in her own little world. In fact, I’m not sure she’s ever not been in her own little world. I mean, she’s never seen a doorbell before. The thinks it’s some amazing button that makes people appear. She’s never seen an air conditioner before, but as soon as she sees one, she hates it.
The story starts with Yotsuba and her dad moving to a new city. When one of her neighbors asks where they moved from, Yotsuba says “Left!” She’s a strange little kid.
Not a lot actually happens in the story. At least, not in the first volume. I haven’t had a chance to read the others. Yotsuba wanders around her neighborhood, meets some of the people there, catches cicadas, and goes shopping at a department store. What makes this worth reading is that it’s like Yotsuba has never done any of this stuff before, so it’s all new and strange to her. Also, she has no filter between her brain and her mouth, so if she says everything that goes through her head. Everything.
Her facial expressions and the odd things she says and the really bizarre ways she misunderstands daily life are all just hilarious.
In case you are wondering, the title is pronounced “Yotsuba to!” which means “Yotsuba and!” Most of the chapter titles are like “Yotsuba & Shopping” or “Yotsuba & Rain” or “Yotsuba & something else that totally confuses her.”
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Where to Find It
[librarylist]
[linkplus name=”Yotsuba&!” url=”http://csul.iii.com/search/X?SEARCH=t:(yotsuba)&SORT=D&l=eng” series=false cchasone=some]
[librarydate]
This post written by Clarissa Mistress of Spices
by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
[cover name=mistressofspices]
I really enjoyed this book, but it’s hard to describe. It’s by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, formerly a community college creative writing instructor at Foothill in Los Altos, and it’s set in Oakland (not the expensive, yuppie side of Oakland, but the more interesting and sometimes dangerous areas). It’s usually just listed as fiction, literature, or magical realism, but I disagree. It’s fantasy start to finish. I would even say, given the role the San Francisco and Oakland play in it, with the immigrants’ and locals’ hopes and dreams and crimes, urban fantasy. Yes, it’s fantasy based in on cultures that have been continuously alive (India) rather than the more common urban fantasy that’s loosely based on what we know about ancient Celtic cultures, but there’s also plenty of Catholic- and Haitian Vodou- and other continuous-living-tradition-derived-based urban fantasy out there, so I hope nobody from the Indian subcontinent will be upset if I label this as urban fantasy of a kind. (Anyway, my impression is that the details of the magic in the book were totally made up by the author, besides the traditional elements of Ayurvedic medicine and whatnot, but please let me know if I’m wrong.)
The main character is Tilo, a “Spice Mistress” who can use power-infused spices from around the world to solve the problems of the customers who step through the doors of her little shop in Oakland. To wield such magic, she has had to pay a high price. She’s a young woman trapped in an old woman’s body, trapped in the store, but because she chose this life, she doesn’t view it as a trap. Until she meets someone who’s different …
One of the things I thought was interesting about this book was that it doesn’t shy away from racial issues–Tilo is aware of her ethnicity, her customers’ ethnicity, and so on. That’s not the main focus of the book, but it comes into play. There is a movie, but from everything I’ve heard, it removes all of the most interesting parts of the book, including Tilo’s fascinating back story before she becomes a Mistress of Spices (AWESOME). And speaking of ethnicity, as far as I understand, they actually change one of the most important characters’ backgrounds to be completely white, which is totally obnoxious because that character’s background is really important to the story. The movie might be interesting if you really like Aishwarya Rai, the famously beautiful Indian actress, but I don’t have any interest in seeing it, because it turns a complex, multilayered fantasy that includes a love story into a fluffy romance.
Be warned that the writing style is unusual and sometimes almost poetry-like. One reason for this is that the author is trying to convey the different patterns of the characters’ voices, I think, so that you will notice the way characters from different regions of India have different ways of speaking English. (English is one of various native languages for many people in India and Pakistan, and one of the reasons this is so, even after the end of colonialism, is that there are multiple language families in that part of the world that are not related to each other at all. There is no “Indian language” or single “Indian accent.” Many of the languages within India are mutually unintelligible, being far more different from each other than French and Spanish–since those come from a single language family.) Other times there’s unusual punctuation or sentence structure just to convey a sense of dreaminess, I think. Just go with it! It’s definitely not for everyone, but give it a few chapters and see if you can get into it.
This book is a great demonstration of the American literature market’s weirdness about “genre fiction,” which includes fantasy, science fiction, mysteries, romance, horror, and other things that book critics, some so-called intellectuals, and many literature and creative writing professors look down on. (Not all of them–I have a master’s degree in English myself.) This book is usually referred to as literary fiction, but as far as I’m concerned, it and similar things like Chocolat are fantasy. There seem to be some unspoken rules that most critics and professors would apply to books like this, like If It Addresses Real Issues Such As the Immigrant Experience It Cannot Be Genre Fiction, and If It Has Interesting Punctuation or Other Fancy Writing Tricks It Cannot Be Genre Fiction, and If There Are Parts Where You Can’t Tell Metaphor from Reality It Cannot Be Genre Fiction, and Basically If Reviewers Liked It It Cannot Be Genre Fiction, Because They Have Never Actually Read Any. So in order for a book critic, etc., to speak positively about a genre book, they can’t admit that it’s a genre book (unless it’s “for kids,” like Harry Potter). They have to pretend that despite the blatant use of magic (Chocolat, Mistress of Spices, Practical Magic, etc.), being set in the future (The Handmaid’s Tale, The Sparrow, etc.) and so on that something isn’t fantasy or science fiction. (Actually, I think that’s part of how the term “magical realism” got invented, to be totally honest.) It’s pretty funny in some ways, but it also backfires when students, writers, and others can’t get taken seriously because their books got labeled one way while some very similar book got labeled another way.
But this is genre fiction. And if you read widely within genre fiction, you will encounter all of these concepts and everything else that literary fiction does well, because just like all other things in life, genre fiction has a wide range from “complete crud” to “utterly excellent.”
Anyway, although this book is definitely not for everyone, I recommend it if you think you might enjoy a fantastic journey into a dreamland of spices, magic, and love, firmly grounded right here in the Bay Area. But be warned that you’ll be craving an aromatic cup of masala chai afterwards!
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Where to Find It
[librarylist]
[librarydate]
This post written by Clint Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch
by Terry Pratchett (UK website here) and Neil Gaiman
[cover name=goodomens]
Do you like stories about the apocalypse, complete with evil nuns, prophecies, angels, demons, and the Antichrist? Well, either way, you might like Good Omens. It’s a spoof of these kinds of stories – sort of like End of Days, except deliberately funny. And with no Arnold Schwarzenegger. It’s also like Dogma, but without Chris Rock or Jason Mewes.
The End Times are near, but there’s a little problem. There was a little accident at the hospital when the Antichrist was born, and he was accidentally switched with a normal baby. Eventually, the forces of good and evil figure out that the guy they think is the Antichrist is just some kid, while somewhere out there the real Antichrist is living a normal life. Several different groups are out to find him. Unfortunately, figuring out which ordinary eleven-year-old boy is actually the Spawn of Satan and Prince of Lies is kind of difficult. In fact, the only person who had any clue about all this died 300 years ago. Her name was Agnes Nutter, and before she died, she wrote down her prophecies in a book called The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch. Agnes didn’t really understand the 20th century, though, so she had a lot of trouble explaining what she saw. As a result, her prophecies are almost useless – you’ll only understand one after it’s too late.
The cast of characters includes Elvis, evil nuns, the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (who now ride motorcycles), the elite Witch-Finder Army (two people), a demonic Hell-hound, an unlikely team of the angel Aziraphale and the demon Crowley (who happen to be good friends), and quite a few other strange and amusing people.
If you take Christianity so seriously that you can’t laugh at it, you’ll probably hate this book. Also, if you don’t like sly humor, you’ll probably dislike this book. Otherwise, give it a try. How often is the end of the world a laughing matter?
To get the most from Good Omens, you need to be pretty familiar with the history of Christianity. The book is still very funny even if you know next to nothing about religion, but if you want to get every little joke and reference, there are a couple of sites that you might want to check out. One is http://goodomenslexicon.org, and another is http://www.lspace.org/books/apf/good-omens.html.
You can read a chapter online at the publisher’s website. There are funnier parts to the book, though. Also, for some strange reason, the people at HarperCollins couldn’t be bothered to proofread the excerpt. Basically, the book is way better than this excerpt would lead you to believe.
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Where to Find It
[librarylist]
[librarydate]
This post written by Clint Peppers: A Story of Hot Pursuits
by Amal Naj
[cover name=peppers]
Amal Naj grew up in India, so you’d think he’d be okay with hot peppers. However, he really didn’t like spicy food until he was in college in Ireland and started to miss food from home. From there, he went on to be a hot pepper junkie. If you really love hot food, this is probably a book for you. Peppers: A Story of Hot Pursuits is a collection of pepper facts and stories.
This book covers a lot of pepper-related topics. It includes some of the history of peppers around the world and how they have been used as medicine. It also includes some science – Naj hangs out with a number of biologists who study peppers. Two chapters cover the rather bizarre story of McIlhenny Company, the people who make Tabasco sauce. Naj also describes some of his pepper-related travels, such as his visit to Hatch, New Mexico, which is probably the hot pepper capital of the United States, or the Andes mountains in Bolivia, where he joins in the search for the the original wild pepper.
This book came out in 1993, so some of the facts, especially where people talk about the science of peppers and how they are used in medicine, are probably outdated. There is no mention of the Naga Jolokia (the ghost pepper), either. Habaneros are as hot as this book gets. I also noticed that this is not the easiest book to read, although it’s not that bad. The author sometimes uses larger words when shorter ones would work just fine, and sometimes the science sections get bogged down by long lists of names. As long as you know to expect it, you should be fine.
Also, if you want to read more about Tabasco sauce, you might want to check out this series of articles from 2004.
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Where to Find It
[linkplus name=”Peppers” url=”http://csul.iii.com/record=b12113516~S0″]
[librarydate]
This post written by Clint Are You Really Going to Eat That?: Confessions of a Culinary Thrill Seeker
by Robb Walsh
[cover name=areyoureallygoingtoeatthat]
Robb Walsh was in the advertising business when he started writing about food and restaurants on the side. Pretty soon, newspapers were paying him to travel to different parts of the world and review unusual foods. Not long after that, he lost his advertising job and his wife divorced him. He’s still writing about food, though, and according to his blog, he’s married again.
Are You Really Going to Eat That? is a collection of some of the articles he has written for various newspapers and magazines from 1993 to 2003. Don’t let the title fool you. While Walsh really has eaten bugs and other stuff that most people in the United States would find extremely unusual, that’s not what this book is about.
These articles are about more than just restaurants and food. Walsh gets a little bit of culture and history. He also introduces us to some interesting people like Jay, the owner of a Houston bagel shop who threatens him for taking notes in the restaurant. I doubt you’ll visit many of the places Walsh writes about, but the stories he tells are interesting enough to keep you reading.
Most of the foods Walsh tries aren’t that far out, especially if you live in California. You might learn about some new foods, but a lot of it is about fairly ordinary things like hot sauce, coffee, cheese, oysters, crabs, and bagels. However, Walsh always finds some interesting angle on his foods, and he often travels to various parts of Europe or the Americas to learn more.
For example, he goes to Switzerland and France to find out who really invented Gruyère cheese, since the two countries have been fighting over it for years and years. He heads down to Argentina to check out the pizza places in Buenos Aires.* He visits Trinidad to find out about curry and hot sauce, and he goes to a prison to find a famous soul food chef.
Of course, he does spend some time looking at foods that some of you may not be familiar with. My favorite is the durian, a huge, spiky fruit that tastes delicious and smells like a herd of rotting cows. (It’s the fruit on the cover, right beneath the machete.)
As a bonus, Walsh includes twenty recipes that you might (or might not) want to try out.
You can read some of it online at Google Books. If you need more, you can check out the author’s blog.
* Sorry, Robb. The best pizza out there is Zuppardi’s Apizza in West Haven, CT.
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Where to Find It
[librarylist]
[librarydate]
This post written by Clint Carpe Demon: Adventures of a Demon-Hunting Soccer Mom
by Julie Kenner
[cover name=carpedemon]
Kate Connors never went to high school or college, but she had a job she loved and was good at. Then she married a co-worker and settled down to raise a family, and she never even thought about going back to work. She used to be a demon hunter, and that’s not really something you can do while also raising kids.
Kate has been a full-time mother and a full-time wife for the past fifteen years. Her husband doesn’t know about her past, and she’d like to keep it that way. She really wants her husband to see her as a wife and not an unstoppable killing machine. Her daughter doesn’t know about her past, although Kate might tell her one of these days. Her son doesn’t know and wouldn’t care if she told him, since he’s only two years old. Kate doesn’t really like keeping secrets, but since she’s not longer fighting demons, nobody really needs to know.
Her husband is running for a political office and has to win important people over, and one day he calls her to ask if she can put together a dinner party for that evening. Then an old demon jumps through her window and tries to kill her. Now she has to clean up the glass, hide the demon corpse, and make the dinner party happen.
This is where Kate’s life gets fun. Some big, bad demons are moving in on her town, and due to budget cuts and recruiting trouble, she’s the only demon hunter around. She does eventually get the help of an alimentatore, an advisor who is the brain while Kate is the brawn. Unfortunately, her alimentatore has a day job, so he makes Kate dig through records. She also gets the help of another retired hunter. Unfortunately, he’s currently in a nursing home. She also finds a sidekick. Unfortunately, when danger threatens, her sidekick plans to scream and run. Then, of course, she’s got to deal with her husband, teenage daughter, and two-year-old son. With help like this, how can she lose? Oh, and she’s a little out of shape, too. Not a lot, but enough to make fighting demons dangerous.
You can read some of it online at Google Books.
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Where to Find It
[librarylist]
[librarydate]
This post written by Clint Epitaph for a Peach: Four Seasons on My Family Farm
by David Mas Masumoto
[cover name=epitaphforapeach]
David Masumoto’s family farm, near Fresno in the Central Valley of Northern California, is in trouble. His peaches taste really good, but he can’t sell them to big business because his peaches can’t be kept in refrigerators at major supermarkets for weeks and weeks. New kinds of peaches don’t taste as good, but they do last a lot longer, and that’s what corporations want. However, David decides to give his old-fashioned peaches one more year, and if he can’t sell them, he’ll tear them down and put in new, less-tasty peaches.
Running a family farm isn’t easy, even if people are interested in buying your products. The Masumoto farm grows peaches and raises grapes. Insects, drought, or disease can kill his trees and vines or destroy the fruit before the harvest. Even worse, sine the family dries the grapes in the sun to make raisins, any rain after the grapes are harvested will cause the grapes to mold. That’s right, rain at the wrong time will actually hurt the farm. How fair is that?
The Masumoto farm is an organic farm – they don’t use chemical fertilizer or insecticides. They try to work with nature rather than against it. Unfortunately, David is kind of new to this. His father farmed in the 50s and 60s, when people thought that chemicals were the ultimate answer to everything. Like some farmers, David has noticed that this isn’t true, but since he didn’t grow up doing things the organic way, he has to learn for himself.
Epitaph for a Peach is made up of a bunch of short pieces that represent his thoughts and experiences for that year. In some of these pieces, he tells us about his struggle to run a family farm and find a market for delicious peaches that nobody wants to buy. In others, we learn about the story of his parents and grandparents, what it was like to grow up on a farm, what living on a farm is like now, or glimpses of what it’s like to be Japanese-American. He is often very serious or philosophical, but other times he is funny.
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Where to Find It
[librarylist]
[librarydate]
This post written by Clint The Grin of the Dark
by Ramsey Campbell
[cover name=thegrinofthedark]
Simon Lester is a film critic, but he isn’t doing that well at it: he works part-time at the local gas station. Then one of his old college professors asks him if he is interested in writing a book on Tubby Thackeray, who was a comedian from the era of silent movies. Tubby used to be famous, but now it seems like nobody has heard of him. In fact, Simon has a terrible time finding anything about him. His films seem to have been removed from film archives, and things written about him seem to have been lost or destroyed. When he asks people about Tubby, they often get hostile. Clowns threaten him. Some guy on an Internet forum starts giving him trouble.
Finally, Simon finds people who know about Tubby Thackeray and are willing to share information and copies of his old films. Some of his work is really bizarre and troubling, and it seems to follow Simon home. The spirit of Tubby starts to take over his life, and it seems to be possessing his girlfriend’s son. Simon has enough trouble in the real world without any supernatural events, and he starts to crack up.
This story is dark and disturbing, but it doesn’t have much blood or gore. Supernatural things happen, but the real horror is in Tubby’s films and Simon’s head.
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This post written by Clint The Invention of Hugo Cabret
by Brian Selznick
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Hugo’s father used to work in a museum. That’s where he found the automaton – a clockwork human sitting at a desk, ready to write a letter. Sadly, the automaton was broken, and Hugo’s father never figured out how to repair it. When he died, Hugo inherited the mechanical man and his father’s notebooks.
Hugo also inherited his uncle’s job, sort of. His uncle used to keep all the clocks in a Paris train station wound and running okay. In exchange, he and Hugo were allowed to live in a little apartment in the station. His uncle disappeared one day, so now Hugo secretly winds all the clocks on his own. As long as nobody notices that his uncle is gone, Hugo can keep living in the station and trying to fix the automaton.
Hugo needs parts to fix the automaton, so he steals toys from a toy store in the train station. He’s not that good of a thief, though, so the shopkeeper catches him, confiscates the notes his father gave him, and makes him work to pay for everything he stole. Then things get complicated.
The story is told through a mix of pictures and words. This isn’t quite the same as most graphic novels, where pictures contain words. Instead, some pages have words and others have pictures, but the two don’t really mix. You might find thirty or forty pictures in a row with no words, so you really have to pay attention to the art if you want to understand what is going on in the story.
You can watch a slide show of the opening pictures at the author’s website.
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