Saturday, March 31, 2012

Once Again, Texas Leads the Way

One Ton Of Marijuana, Worth More Than $7 Million, Seized On Texas Highway

Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

Time for a Slim Whitman Revival!

‘Mars Attacks!’ the Musical is Coming to Broadway

Letterman

Is it just me, or is Letterman's monologue the same one every night?  It's like he records them all on the same day and just changes suits and ties.  The suits look nice, but the jokes are the same ones, every single night of the week.  They don't get any better with repetition, in case you were wondering. Even the film clips are the same ones.  It makes it easy on the cue-card writer.  He can just use the same cards all week.  Or maybe for several weeks.

Song of the Day

The Chicken Hanger -- Ben Rehder

Ben Rehder is the Edgar-nominated author of the Blanco County mystery series, but in The Chicken Hanger, he's exploring new territory.  It's a look at the problem of illegal immigration in Texas, told from the points of view of a number of characters, primarily one of the immigrants, a burned-out Border Patrol officer, and a rancher.  Ricky, the immigrant, works in a chicken processing plant.  You might never eat chicken again after reading about the job he does.  His brother, Tomas, crosses into Texas illegally, and he gets his thumb shot off by the rancher.  After that, things get complicated by psittacosis, lawsuits, and plenty of other problems.  


This book comes from a prestigious university press, but don't let that scare you.  It's not one of those literary novels with no plot and characters who eat little sandwiches with no crusts on them.  It's full of action and great characters, and there's even a good bit of humor.  It's also a fairly even-handed look at the immigration problem.  Rehder doesn't duck the facts, and he's careful to show both sides, though Ricky and his brother are certainly sympathetic characters as opposed to some of the others.


If you're looking for a well-written, provocative novel that's a little bit different, you can't go wrong.  Highly recommended.

Today's Vintage Ad


Want to Own a Little Bit of History?

 The Washington Post: Historic guitars from Les Paul’s personal collection and recording equipment owned by the pioneering musician will be sold at auction.


Celebrity auctioneer Darren Julien says the sale includes rare guitars, effects pedals, mixing consoles and the grand piano from Paul’s home recording studio. Julien’s Auctions in Beverly Hills will host the sale over three days, including what would have been Paul’s 97th birthday: June 9.

An Interesting Blog

Woodcuttingfool is  . . . woodcuts.  Sometimes of Hollywood characters.  They're all interesting, and they all include commentary.  Check it out.

And Keep Off His Lawn!

Man fires shots to quiet noisy kids, cops say

PaperBack

Richard Ellington, It's a Crime, Pocket Books, 1950.

Top 10 Crazy Things You Can Buy From Hammacher Schlemmer

Top 10 Crazy Things You Can Buy From Hammacher Schlemmer

NYC Leads the Way

The 50 Words Banned From NYC Standardized Tests

12 of the Greatest Movie Roles Almost Played

12 of the Greatest Movie Roles Almost Played

Today's Western Movie Poster


Yet Another List I'm Not On

Whodunit? 10 Famous Ghostwriting Collaborations

The 25 Greatest Breakup Songs of the 1960s

The 25 Greatest Breakup Songs of the 1960s 

Hat tip to Todd Mason.

5 Reasons 'The Hunger Games' is Creepier than You Think

5 Reasons 'The Hunger Games' is Creepier than You Think

Tim Tyler's Luck

Friday, March 30, 2012

PimPage: An Occasional Feature in Which I Call Interesting Books to Your Attention

I read most of the stories in this book in their other incarnations, some of them on the 'Net and others in print.  They've been revised for this edition, but that should only had to their effectiveness.  Hardboiled prose, noir sensibility, and all very effective.  Check it out.

Amazon.com: Roachkiller and Other Stories eBook: R. Narvaez: Kindle Store: A pregnant single mother who becomes a numbers runner in 1970s Brooklyn; an ex-con fighting against insurmountable odds not to kill again; a middle-aged tax lawyer who’s discovered the secret to happiness—at any cost: these are just a few of the hard-luck characters you’ll meet in Roachkiller and Other Stories, the debut collection of short stories from exciting noir writer R. Narvaez. Included are 10 hard-boiled tales, many with a dash of dark humor. Get-rich schemes gone violently awry. A slacker detective far out of his depth. A reformed criminal who can’t get past his killer instincts. The action moves from Brooklyn to Puerto Rico, from the ’70s to the near future, from deadly divorces to homicidal hipsters. Narvaez travels down the dimly lit side streets of noir you’ve never seen before.

And Keep Off Her Lawn!

This is legal in Florida, right?

Naples Daily News: A 71-year-old woman stood at her bedroom doorway pointing a .45 caliber handgun and warned the visitors in her home that she would shoot.


Patricia Mapes stood her ground. It didn’t matter that the visitors were Lee County deputies, according to arrest reports.


“I don’t care who you are. I’ll shoot you,” Mapes told deputies last Friday night (March 23) after they entered her home, called out for the woman and identified themselves.

FROM DUNDEE'S DESK

FROM DUNDEE'S DESK: Available Now - AND FLESH AND BLOOD SO CHEAP on Kindle

Here's the Plot for Your Next James Bond Pastiche

Scientists Can Now Control Lightning Strikes with Laser

Once Again, Texas Leads the Way

Texas cop filmed threatening to arrest men for being afraid of Taser 

Will the Persecution Never End?

Who Are the 10 Most Overexposed Celebrities?

Anybody Can Make a Mistake

Fox News: A Colorado man was sentenced to five years' probation after accidentally shooting a woman whose red mohawk he mistook for a fowl that had been harassing his cats.

Spinetingler Awards

Spinetingler nominees.  Congrats to all.

First It Was the Thin Mints Melee . . .

The Daily Stamford: A Stamford Academy student was arrested Wednesday and charged with trying to strangle a teacher with his own necktie, police said.

A Kickstarter Project of Possible Interest

The Astonishing Adventures of Doc Wilde!!! by Tim Byrd — Kickstarter

Once Again, Texas Leads the Way

The 20 Best-Performing Cities In America

5 Terrifying Serial Killers Who Happened to Be Animals

5 Terrifying Serial Killers Who Happened to Be Animals

Song of the Day

:

12 Great Small Press Books Recommended by Literary Insiders

12 Great Small Press Books Recommended by Literary Insiders

Today's Vintage Ad


A Poll

What Are The Best Private Eye Novels of All Time?

Once Again, Texas Leads the Way

And keep off her lawn!

NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth: A 71-year-old Richland Hills grandmother was charged with a hate crime after she attacked a gay neighbor with her cane while yelling offensive slurs, police said.

PaperBack




















Richard Ellington, Shoot the Works, Pocket Books, 1949

Paris Hilton Update

News.com.au: FOR Paris Hilton, a question about what her life might be like after fame was enough to get Channel 7 reporter Edwina Bartholomew banned from tonight's VIP party at The Star's Marquee bar.


But after the star - famous for being famous - was lambasted over the over reaction on this morning's Sunrise, it seems Hilton has extended an email olive branch and welcomed Bartholomew back onto the guest list.


Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

Warren Stevens, R. I. P.

NYTimes.com: Warren Stevens, a lanky, square-jawed actor with swept-back hair and a husky voice whose face became familiar through his more than 100 roles on television and in movies over six decades, died on Tuesday at his home in Sherman Oaks, Calif. He was 92.


Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

Harry Crews, R. I. P.

 NY Daily News: Author Harry Crews, a hell-raiser and cult favorite whose hard and crazy times inspired his brutal tales of the rural South, died Wednesday in Gainesville, Fla. He was 76 and had suffered from neuropathy, said his ex-wife, Sally Ellis Crews.


“He had been very ill,” she told The Associated Press on Thursday. “In a way it was kind of a blessing. He was in a lot of pain.” Thanks in part to motorcycle accidents and nerve damage in his feet, he had walked with a cane in recent years. But his career remained active. An excerpt from a forthcoming memoir had been published in the Georgia Review and there was talk of reissuing his books, many of them out of print, in digital editions.


He wasn’t widely known, but those who knew him— whether personally or through his books — became devoted. A wild man and truth teller in the tradition of Charles Bukowski and Hunter Thompson, he wrote bloodied stories drawn directly from his own experiences, including boxing and karate. Crews sported a tattoo with a line from an E.E. Cummings poem, “How do you like your blue-eyed boy Mister Death,” on his right bicep under the tattoo of a skull.


Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

The All-Time Weirdest Facial Hair on Film

The All-Time Weirdest Facial Hair on Film

25 Celebrities That Look Like Mattresses

25 Celebrities That Look Like Mattresses

Today's Western Movie Poster


Illegitimacy in Literature

AbeBooks: Illegitimacy in Literature: Today we’re talking about books featuring people born out of wedlock, not bastard titles (which is another matter entirely). For centuries, a child born outside of marriage was a cause for terrible shame. There were all manner of legal issues and the status of ‘bastard’ had huge influence on how a person was perceived by society.

20 Colleges with Really Cool Robots on Campus

20 Colleges with Really Cool Robots on Campus

Once Again, Texas Leads the Way

Dine just like the passengers of the doomed Titanic for $12,000

Who Says Hollywood is Out of Ideas?

'Twins' Sequel 'Triplets' in the Works for Arnold, DeVito...and Eddie Murphy

Forgotten Books: Who Done It? -- Alice Laurance & Isaac Asimov, Editors

If you can read the dust jacket, you know the gimmick here.  Seventeen writers contributed stories, but we aren't told which story is by which writer.  So you have to read the story and decide who the writer is, based on the style.  There's no answer key, but there's a cryptogram at the beginning of each story.  You're told how to solve the cryptograms in case you can guess the writer, though by the time you work through all that, you might have lost interest in figuring it out.  


The authors who contributed stories are John Ball, Robert Bloch, Dorothy Salisbury Davis, Rosemary Gatenby, Michael Gilbert, Elizabeth Gresham, Joe L. Hensley, Edward D. Hoch, R. A. Lafferty, John D. MacDonald, Florence Mayberry, Patricia Moyes, Rachael Cosgrove Payes, Bill Pronzini, Ruth Rendell, Lawrence Treat, and Janwillem van de Wetering.  I have to admit that I wasn't familiar with some of the names, and I also have to admit that I was surprised to see R. A. Lafferty listed as a contributor.  He doesn't turn up in many crime anthologies.


While the good Dr. Asimov doesn't have a story in the book, h e does contribute an eight-page introduction on the topic of writing style that's worth your time.  Cheap copies of the book abound on the Internet.

Wild in the Country

Thursday, March 29, 2012

Our Constitutional Rights Continue to Erode

Fox News: A man who led tour groups on a hunt for Bigfoot met up with the long arm of the law instead, and got fined for doing business on federal lands without a permit.

Perfect Bookends for Your Collection of Anger Management Self-Help Books

Perfect Bookends for Your Collection of Anger Management Self-Help Books

Those Sods!

Man wakes to find front lawn stolen

Hat tip to Lawrence Person.

Des Moines Leads the Way

Des Moines man accused of urinating on office chairs

Once Again, Texas Leads the Way

Texas man yells 'Go Cowboys!' before execution

Song of the Day

Beautiful British Book Jacket Design of the 1950s and 1960s

Existential Ennui's Beautiful British Book Jacket Design of the 1950s and 1960s

And see also this post.

'Flying Pancake' Aircraft Comes To Dallas Museum

'Flying Pancake' Aircraft Comes To Dallas Museum

Video of the prototype and the test flight of the actual plan can be found here.

I'm Still Sticking with the Cheeseburger

Urine-soaked eggs a spring taste treat in China city

Geraldo Warns Monks to Avoid Florida

Today's Vintage Ad


Jerry Boogie McCain, R. I. P.

GadsdenTimes.com: Jerry “Boogie” McCain, a Gadsden native who gained international acclaim as a prolific singer/songwriter and blues harmonica player, died Wednesday. He was 81.


McCain had a long music career that spanned the decades from 1953, when he made his first recordings, to his death. His best-known songs include “Ain't No Use for Drug Abuse” and “Burn the Crackhouse Down,” which he wrote about goings-on in his neighborhood.

Keeping Our Country Safe

TSA officers charged with trashing South Beach hotel room, shooting gun

PaperBack

 Jonathan Latimer, The Dead Don't Care, Macfadden, 1964

Once Again, Texas Leads the Way

PD: Lewisville Man Kills Wife After Dog Defecates In House


A List I'm On

Frugal Dad’s Top Author Blogs 

Here's the Plot for Your Next Murder-For-Hire/Drug Thriller

Kevin Corley's Murder-For-Hire/Drug Complaint Reads Like Quentin Tarantino Movie

Archaeology Update

Researchers uncover 8,000 years of human history hidden in the Middle East: How do you map the expansion of Earth's earliest civilizations? For years, researchers have tackled this daunting task on a settlement-by-settlement basis, searching for clues in mounds of earth throughout the Middle East.


But now, researchers have turned to satellite imagery to uncover a vast network of over 14,000 long-overlooked Mesopotamian settlements, spanning 8,000 years of ancient civilization. Their findings represent a monumental step forward for the fields of archeology and anthropology, and suggest that an aerial perspective may hold the key to unlocking the mysteries of humanity's first major settlements.

Bastard Cabbage WBAGNFARB

Bastard cabbage attacks! 

Today's Western Movie Poster


Forgotten Music -- Patti Page

Miss Patti Page, the Singin' Rage is still with us, but most people under 50 probably don't remember her.  Those over 50 don't likely think about her much.  But in the early '50s she was indeed the Singin' Rage, with songs like "Tennesse Waltz," which must have been #1 for months.  One of my favorites was "Mr. and Mississippi." I was also quite fond of "Detour."  One of her big hits was a novelty song about a doggie in a window.  This one's probably not forgotten, and you might curse me for reminding you of it.  But you'll never curse me for reminding you of the Singin' Rage.

10 Big Brain Benefits of Playing Chess

10 Big Brain Benefits of Playing Chess

21 Best Horror Movies of the 21st Century - HorrorMovies.ca

21 Best Horror Movies of the 21st Century


Link via SF Signal.

Joe Lansdale Video Update

The Lineup: EDGE OF DARK WATER Edition

Once Again, Texas Leads the Way

Farmer resorts to 'guard bees' to protect property

Hat tip to Angela Crider.

Wild Country

Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Australia Leads the Way

Australian Drug Maker Close To A Cure For The Common Cold

Earl Scruggs, R. I. P.

Earl Scruggs, bluegrass legend, dies – USATODAY.com: Country Music Hall of Famer Earl Scruggs, a singular talent of collective import, died Wednesday morning at a Nashville hospital. He was 88.


But Scruggs' legacy is in no way limited to or defined by bluegrass, a genre that he and partner Lester Flatt dominated as Flatt and Scruggs in the 1950s and '60s: His adaptability and open-minded approach to musicality and to collaboration made him a bridge between genres and generations.


Hat tip to Seepy Benton.

Surely Not

Could the newest trend in Bay Area food be … edible insects?


Hat tip to Art Scott.

Adrienne Rich, R. I. P.

Adrienne Rich Is Dead at 82: The poet Adrienne Rich has died, the LA Times reports. At 82 years old, she was among the most influential feminist writers of her generation, the winner of countless major awards, and a woman both important enough to be selected for the National Medal for the Arts in 1997 and radical enough to refuse it on political grounds. Born in Baltimore in 1929, she published her first collection before graduating from Radcliffe and remained a prolific poet and essayist into the final years of her life. Rich died yesterday in her Santa Cruz, CA home of complications from rheumatoid arthritis.

No Comment Department

Lady Blames Car Accident On Her Vibrating Panties

No Comment Department

TSA Manager Arrested for Running Prostitution Ring

Short story competition

Blasted Heath Short story competition: We’re delighted to be sponsoring a short crime story competition with Bloody Scotland, Scotland’s first international crime writing festival (Stirling, September 14-16th).


Along with the chance to win a unique killer first prize from Glengoyne Whisky (worth  £ 3,000) and a residential writing course with Arvon, you could be included in an anthology of the best entries published right here by the Heath.
We’ll be publishing Worth The Wait in September to coincide with the festival.

Nic Cage Update

Nic Cage Is Inspired By His Pet Cobra

Song of the Day

Cartoon of the Day


Linkc

Today's Vintage Ad

Available Now!

Click the link and buy! Or at least "like" it!

Amazon.com: Carnival of Death (Dead Man #9) eBook: Bill Crider, Lee Goldberg, William Rabkin: Kindle Store

PaperBack


Jonathan Latimer, Headed for a Hearse, Macfadden, 1964



The Grace of a Shadowy Street

Book Review: Goodis | The Complete Slayers - WSJ.com: The Grace of a Shadowy Street

9 Shocking Honeymoon Deaths

9 Shocking Honeymoon Deaths

I Am Not Mr. C

Meet the Comic Book Collector: Classics Illustrated and their Literary Twins

Today's Western Movie Poster

25 Novels to Honor Women’s History Month

25 Novels to Honor Women’s History Month

Once Again, Texas Leads the Way

Houston News: Just when we threw up our hands in despair over the dearth of worthwhile presidential candidates, a federal prisoner in Texas has made it onto the ballot in West Virginia.

Excellent mugshot at the link.

10 Oft-Overlooked Irish Novels to Honor this Month

10 Oft-Overlooked Irish Novels to Honor this Month

11 Harmful Myths About How We Learn

11 Harmful Myths About How We Learn 

Hilton Kramer, R. I. P.

NYTimes.com: Hilton Kramer, whose clear, incisive style and combative temperament made him one of the most influential critics of his era, both at The New York Times, where he was the chief art critic for almost a decade, and at The New Criterion, which he edited from its founding in 1982, died early Tuesday in Harpswell, Me. He was 84.


Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

The Saint

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

The Devil's Bones -- Larry Sweazy

Larry Sweazy's an award-winning western writer, and now he's stepping into the modern era with this crime novel about a Jordan McManus, a deputy marshal in a small Indiana town. His superior has been murdered just as he was about to investigate the discovery of a skeleton in a pond. The skeleton's been revealed by a severe drought, and the suspicion is that it's that of a young boy who disappeared years earlier.

But that's not true. The boy is alive, and he becomes a second important character in the story as McManus tries to solve the crime. McManus has plenty of issues of his own, and he has to deal with them as well as the murder. After a second murder, things race to the climax.

The Devil's Bones is a tightly written thriller that gets the job done. I'd been planning to write a Sheriff Rhodes book based on the Texas drought, but I don't think I will. Sweazy's done such a good job with the small town and the characters here that I couldn't add a thing.

Available Now!

Click the link and buy! Or at least "like" it!

Amazon.com: Carnival of Death (Dead Man #9) eBook: Bill Crider, Lee Goldberg, William Rabkin: Kindle Store

Bert Sugar, R. I. P.

NYTimes.com: Bert Sugar, boxing’s human encyclopedia, a prolific writer and editor and a flamboyant and ubiquitous presence in the world of the ring, died on Sunday in Mount Kisco, N.Y. He was 75.

Song of the Day

:

Yikes

2 Arrested in Separate Cannibal Cases

Hat tip to Fred Zackel.

10 Awesomely Weird Car Modifications

10 Awesomely Weird Car Modifications

Hat tip to Doc Quatermass.

And Keep Off His Lawn!

Neighbors 'outraged' after man, 80, charged with shooting burglar 

Once Again, Texas Leads the Way

Sarah Tressler: Houston Chronicle Society Writer By Day, Stripper By Night

Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

Today's Vintage Ad

Food Fads of the '60s and '70s Online Quiz

Food Fads of the '60s and '70s Online Quiz

Hat tip to Bobby Vasquez.

15 American Foods That Are as Weird to Foreigners as Poisonous Blowfish Is to Us

15 American Foods That Are as Weird to Foreigners as Poisonous Blowfish Is to Us

JFK Leads the Way

Exclusive: The Stunning John F. kennedy International Airport Baggage Scandal; 200 Thefts Per Day  CBS New York: Law enforcement sources told Kramer that thefts at the airport have increased at a staggering and alarming rate. There are now more that 200 a day — and that’s every day. Baggage handlers, jetway workers and even security people are all in on the ongoing scam to steal you blind.

PaperBack


Joan Henry, Women in Prison, Perma Star, 1953




Oops

Google Earth's New "Ballparks of America" Video Can't Be Bothered To Get The Mets' Stadium Name Right

10 Wonderful Short Stories to Read For Free Online

10 Wonderful Short Stories to Read For Free Online

Top 10 Modern Gadgets that Changed our Lives

Top 10 Modern Gadgets that Changed our Lives

Today's Western Movie Poster

Is It Time to Embrace Pink Slime?

8 Athletes Who Retired In Their Prime

8 Athletes Who Retired In Their Prime

Sounds Reasonable to Me

Town councillor Simon Parkes: My mum was a 9ft green alien 

Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

Here's the Plot for Your Next Pre-Teen Thriller

8-year-old Tennessee boy uses tracking app after break-in

Overlooked Movies -- It Came From Outer Space

When I was a kid, I loved 3-D. The theater in my hometown wasn't equipped to show movies in that format, but for my 12th birthday, my aunt Ellen took me to Dallas to see It Came from Outer Space. This was a big deal in 1953. A trip to Dallas from my hometown, a distance of 90 miles, was like going to Hong Kong now. It required lots of planning and preparation, and for me Dallas was about as exotic as Hong Kong.

Almost as big a thrill as seeing the movie was getting to go to the Majestic Theater. Here's what Wikipedia has to say about that wonderful edifice: The interior lobby and auditorium was of baroque design with decorative detailing consisting of Corinthian columns, egg-and-dart molding, cartouches, and Roman swags and fretwork. The lobby contained a magnificent black-and-white Italian-style Vermont marble floor and twin marble staircases. Other features included an ornate cage elevator serving the two balconies, crystal chandeliers, brass mirrors, ferns and a marble fountain.[2] A concession stand was added to the lobby in the late 1940s.

The auditorium featured a ceiling "sky" of floating clouds and mechanically controlled twinkling stars. Seating was provided on the main floor and in two balconies in woven cane seats. The stage was flanked by massive Corinthian columns, with an orchestra pit in front. Backstage consisted of twelve dressing rooms, a loft to accommodate scenery and a set of wooden lighting controls. A Kilgen theater organ opus 3054 size 2/8 was also installed.[4]

I was, to say the least, impressed. Could the movie live up to the building? Well, it could for me. The stars are Richard Carlson and Barbara Rush. Carlson plays an amateur astronomer who sees a meteor crash in the desert, except it's not a meteor. It's an alien spaceship, as he discovers when he goes to investigate. Nobody believes him, naturally. That's the way it always is in these things. And since the ship is covered by a landslide almost as soon as Carlson finds it, nobody can see it. Nobody else has seen the alien that Carlson sees, either.

You can see where all this is going. It's yet another paranoid thriller from the '50s, and pretty soon weird things begin to happen. People who go out to the desert act strangely. Some of them disappear. Some people even begin to believe Carlson.

I don't want to give too much away, but the movie doesn't work out like you might expect. The aliens are scary, but they aren't what they seem. The movie is one of the better ones of the '50s, though not really in the top rank. I'd love to see it again in 3-D in the Majestic.

It Came From Outer Space

Monday, March 26, 2012

Here's the Plot for Your Next Blonde Thriller

Gang Of Blondes: Over the weekend, Sao Paulo police arrested 3 members of an unlikely gang of criminals known as the "Gang of Blondes". The group of criminals is thought to include six "really pretty" blondes who wreaked havoc around the city by robbing and assuming the identity of fellow beautiful blondes, police chief Joaquim Dias Alves told BBC Mundo.

How Texans View The United States

How Texans View The United States

First It Was the Thin Mints Melee . . .

Worker fights off burglar with sword, beer bottle

Epic Kindle Giveaway: free books: Russell Blake, Scott Nicholson

Epic Kindle Giveaway: free books: Russell Blake, Scott Nicholson

Song of the Day

25 Female Scientists to Celebrate This Month

25 Female Scientists to Celebrate This Month

Today's Vintage Ad

5 Candidates for the First Rock ‘n’ Roll Song

5 Candidates for the First Rock ‘n’ Roll Song

Interview with the Author

The Dead Man: Dead Man #9 - Carnival of Death: Dead Man #9 - Carnival of Death

The 9th book in the DEAD MAN saga, Bill Crider's CARNIVAL OF DEATH, is out this week. We asked Bill a few questions about his career and his new book.

10 Bizarre Vending Machines That Actually Exist

10 Bizarre Vending Machines That Actually Exist

PaperBack


Arthur Lyons, The Dead Are Discreet, Ballantine, 1976



I Report, You Decide

Is this a video of Bigfoot in Idaho earlier this year?

A Brief Guide to Pop Culture in 1966

A Brief Guide to Pop Culture in 1966

And Keep Off Her Lawn!

News - Home: An elderly woman used a water jug to try and fight two robbers outside a Walmart in The Woodlands.

Today's Western Movie Poster

10 Common Illegal Alterations Made to Cars

10 Common Illegal Alterations Made to Cars

5 Cool and 5 Highly Annoying Examples Of Product Pimpage

Celebrity Tech Endorsements: 5 Cool and 5 Highly Annoying Examples Of Product Pimpage

The 10 Greatest Love Affairs in History

The 10 Greatest Love Affairs in History

The Horse Soldiers

Sunday, March 25, 2012

New Story at BEAT to a PULP

BEAT to a PULP :: Pulp of the Week: Eyes Open
Patricia Abbott

PimPage: An Occasional Feature in Which I Call Interesting Books to Your Attention

Fractal DespondencyAmazon.com: Fractal Despondency eBook: Trent Zelazny: Kindle Store: Was she an angel from above, or a walking time bomb of doom?


His life having crumbled, Blake Gladstone returns to his hometown of Santa Fe, and tries to settle back into the unsatisfying life he’d had before he left for Florida.


When he meets Denise, a pretty young blonde with a bag full of tricks, his sad routine breaks, and the more they get to know each other, the more Blake can’t figure out if he’s on a road to salvation, or a road back to hell.

First It Was the Thin Mints Melee . . .

Country music debate leads to Savannah hammer attack

Song of the Day

And Blue Skies from Pain -- Stina Leicht

About a year ago, I said a few words about Stina Leicht's first novel. Good stuff, and now we have the sequel, which is even better. At the end of the first novel, there's an uneasy truce between the fey and the mortals, who have a common enemy, the nephilim. The new book picks up right where the first left off in 1977 Ireland. Liam Kelly, shape-shifter, half mortal, half fey, is to be tested by the Church to see if he's really what he claims to be or if he's really the enemy. Can he trust the inquisitors to be fair? For that matter can he trust anyone in the mortal world, other than his mentor, Father Murray? And what about those ghosts? It's no wonder that Liam wonders if he's going mad.

Of Blue Skies and Pain is gloriously gory, violent, full of color and action, and packed to the walls with incident. In other words, there's a lot going on, and the truce is in the balance. By the end, Liam has grown up a little and some things have been resolved, but Leicht has left herself plenty of room to explore the worlds and characters she's created. Bring on the sequels!

Today's Vintage Ad

Nick Noble, R. I. P.

Oldies Music -- News: Nick Noble, who scored four top 40 national hits from 1955 to 1957, died Saturday (March 24) in his native Chicago. He was 75. Born Nicholas Valkan in 1936, he is best remembered for "The Bible Tells Me So" (#22-1955)on Wing Records and "To You, My Love" (#27-1956), ""A Fallen Star" (#20-1957) and "Moonlight Swim" (#37-1957) on its parent, Mercury Records.

Email in the 18th century: the optical telegraph

Email in the 18th century: the optical telegraph

Link via Neatorama.

PaperBack


Arthur Lyons, All God's Children, Ballantine, 1975




Six Futuristic Films Where Society Watched Ultraviolent Sports

Six Futuristic Films Where Society Watched Ultraviolent Sports

Hat tip to Jeff Segal.

5 Real Judges Who Put the Most Evil Supervillain to Shame

5 Real Judges Who Put the Most Evil Supervillain to Shame

What is the Kindle Doing to the Science Fiction Genre?

What is the Kindle Doing to the Science Fiction Genre?

Link via SF Signal.

Today's Western Movie Poster

10 of the Most Romantic Movie Quotes

10 of the Most Romantic Movie Quotes

Once Again, Texas Leads the Way

Naked home-invasion suspect shot by deputy near Lake Conroe

Amazing Color Photos of Kids in the 1940s

Amazing Color Photos of Kids in the 1940s

The Hurricane