Chicago has wizard-for-hire Harry Dresden. Denver has Kitty Norville, alpha wolf in a pack of werewolves. And now New York City has jewelry designer Garet James. One of these things is not like the others… A jewelry designer? How does that work?
It’s no secret that I am extremely enthusiastic about the latest surge in urban fantasy fiction being published. Sometimes my world seems far too antiseptic, purged of the everyday magic I wish was everywhere. To solve this problem, I retreat into fictional worlds where real magic exists on the streets of today’s urban jungle.
Lee Carroll is a pseudonym for the duo of Carol Goodman (Arcadia Falls, The Night Villa) and her husband – poet and hedge fund manager Lee Slonimsky. The couple live in New York and you can tell from the way they handle NYC as the setting for the book that they love where they live. NYC in the pages of Black Swan Rising comes to life in expected and completely unexpected ways.
Garet James doesn’t see herself as an artist. She takes signet rings, typically bearing the coat of arms of the family of the original wearer, and makes medallions out of them. As a result, she’s always on the lookout for new rings she can use in her own work.
One day she gets caught in a downpour in the city and stumbles into a strange antiques shop. The strange shopkeeper, John Dee, after revealing that he knows of her jewelry, asks if she would look at opening an old silver box. The box just happens to be sealed with a symbol of a swan exactly like the signet ring given to her by her mother before she died. She agrees to take it home to work on it and bring it home the next day. Unfortunately, like Pandora – once the box is open, her world changes dramatically…
Garet and her father own an art gallery that’s been down on its luck in recent years. When thieves break in to steal three paintings, the box, and shoot her father, it’s just the beginning of her troubles. A 400 year old vampires and the King of Faeries help her find her way to stopping the diabolical plans of John Dee before Garet’s beloved city and then the world suffer the consequences…
Black Swan Rising starts at a simmer and rises to a boil. If I have one complaint, it’s that as you move through the book picking up speed, the second half of the book is crammed to the gills with wall to wall action. But that’s a very minor complaint, considering that I hope the next book in the series will continue to tell the story of Garet, the vampire Will Hughes, and the tale of the declining world of the fae barely holding on in an industrialized world…
Throughout the book, I was impressed by the use of passages to describe difficult concepts such as auras and elemental transformation. The hand of the poet was definitely at work as the writing duo show how those with positive, healing or helping auras can affect those around them with a touch or simply by being in the same area…
After a nurse with a healthy green glow got on the train, she gave her seat to an angry man with a red aura… “I saw the angry red glow subside to a pale pink. The woman who’d given up her seat still had the green glow around her, but now it shone brighter and extended farther out around her. It touched the elderly woman with the headache, turning her mustard yellow into a clear daffodil gold. The girl who’d started out with the yellow aura sang a line from a song on her iPod, which made the old man with the gray aura laugh out loud. Colors rippled down the car, turning brighter and clearer, as if that one act – the woman in the scrubs touching the sick man’s arm and giving him her seat – was a pebble cast into the water radiating out into widening circles…”
It’s those scenes that ripple throughout this book and story from beginning to end.
If you’re a fan of urban fantasy or simply want to read a well-written story, check out Black Swan Rising by Lee Carroll… It’s an enjoyable ride that left me wanting more.
This article first appeared at BlogCritics.org here.
–Fitz
p.s. Pick up this and other great urban fantasy books at Barnes & Noble below!
Nothing beats live music. Hands down, the live experience trumps any audio or video recording I’ve ever seen of an artist performing. That said, the next best thing is a concert recording, preferably video so you can see the actual performance instead of simply listening to it.
I have never seen Heart live other than the occasional performance I’ve seen on television. It’s on my list of things to do. But their album Red Velvet Car is probably more intimate than I could possibly be, even if I was sitting in the front row. From beginning to end, I felt with each track like it was recorded in my living room. It might have been a LOUD living room at times where the windows rattled, but you know what I mean…
The sisters Ann and Nancy Wilson have been queens of rock and roll since Dreamboat Annie hit radio waves in 1975, but Red Velvet Car is their first release in six years. This album manages to not only capture the classic Heart sound – from the style of “Barracuda” to that of “Dog and Butterfly” – while adding the new dimension that only age and experience can provide. From the duo’s voices that sound as good as 35 years ago to the guitars, songwriting, and harmonies that only they can create, it’s damn good to hear them rocking out again with some new tunes.
And with ten new tracks, we got a lot of new music to enjoy. I don’t know whether it’s the quieter tunes like “Hey You” and “Sand” or the rocking tunes like “There You Go,” “Wheels,” and “Death Valley” that echo in my mind long after listening… But whether you enjoy the fierce energy of electric guitars or the solace of getting lost in acoustic guitars and voices emotionally telling what can only be personal tales, there’s something for anybody who enjoys good music on this album.
The opening track – “There You Go” – tells a cautionary tale about losing control and being burned. With guitar melodies and rhythms sounding barely under control, you feel like the train is rushing forward only to crash in a ball of flame… “There you go again / Walking straight into the freezing flame / There you go again / There you go in the media insane…” The band is telling some poor innocent soul to be wary of the whirlwind of fame, to watch out for herself.
“Wheels” is another song that just drives along like a freight train in the dark… Again, the guitars and bass lines simply pound the song forward to some unknown destination. As they sing “Just close your eyes now / And breath a sigh now / Out of here” – like some great escape on the rails or open road. It’s impossible not to tap your toes as it drives on. (Note to self – don’t listen to this song while in the car with a known speed trap… )
But it’s “Sand” that sticks with me the longest. The last song on the album, it’s a story of endings or loss. The acoustic guitars set the stage and Ann’s expressive voice felt like I was listening to a song played at a funeral. Something private shared with a crowd to let them know whomever it was that left them is still with them, like sand in the wind. “I asked a distant star / I wonder where you are / the shadow at my door / the friend who is no more…” I couldn’t help but think of a friend I’d lost years ago… “Surely this sweet sand will run out by and by / and while the days come down to you / you are just a traveler passing through…”
It’s the intimacy that just floors me each time I listen to the album. I truly felt as though I had somehow slipped into a jam session as a fly on the wall… soaking up the music and the tales.
Red Velvet Car will be released on August 31, 2010 and I would encourage anyone who’s heard Heart in the past to pick up a copy. It’s another great album from Anne, Nancy, and the band to listen to over and over again.
This article first appeared at BlogCritics.org here.
–Fitz
p.s. Pick up this and other great Heart albums below!
Though I’d seen a few comic books in my youth, my first exposure to the Batman phenomenon was in 1989 when I saw Tim Burton’s Batman on the big screen. From that moment on, Michael Keaton captured the duality of Batman for me – playboy by day (as bazillionaire/tychoon Bruce Wayne) and crime fighter (Batman) by night.
Then in 1992, Batman: The Animated Series really drove that home the comic legacy of the Batman character. Paul Dini and around 30 other writers took the Gotham City from the pages of DC Comics and breathed life into the heroes and villains that walked its streets. It was really the series’ four seasons that Batman graced my television screen that made me appreciate the depth of what DC Comics and Bob Kane had created from the late 1930s to today.
In 2008, a new chapter of Batman animation would unfold as Batman: The Brave and the Bold. But where previous incarnations of the world were portrayed in a serious vein, this new series amped up the campy, fun nature once seen in another Batman television product starring Adam West and Burt Ward as Batman and Robin in the 1960s.
The Brave and the Bold uses Batman (voiced by Diedrich Bader – The Drew Carey Show) as the straight man while still managing to incorporate the classic heroes and villains of the DC Universe with humor. Now DC Animation and Warner Brothers are releasing the first 13 episodes of season one in a two-DVD set – Batman: The Brave and the Bold – Season One – Part One.
In the first 13 episodes, we see an amazing array of heroes share the stage with the Dark Knight… We meet the Blue Beetle (Will Friedle, Batman Beyond, Kim Possible) as he’s just getting used to his alien powers; Plastic Man (Tom Kenny, SpongeBob SquarePants) who’s constantly struggling with his criminal side; the Red Tornado (Corey Burton, who seems to have been in 100+ different cartoons over the last 30 years) who is an android trying to understand what it is to be human…
We also meet:
Green Arrow
Wildcat
Deadman
Bronze Tiger
The Atom
But Aquaman (John Di Maggio, Futurama, Penguins of Madagascar, Ben-10) is by far my favorite. He manages to be endearing and annoying at the same time. Larger than life and willing to tell of his adventures to anyone who will (willingly or unwillingly) listen.
Not to be outdone, we also see many of the classic villains appear along with some I had never heard of… Kite Man (Jeffrey Combs, The 4400, Justice League, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine), gliding thief, nemesis and former employer of Plastic Man; Black Manta (Kevin Michael Richardson, The Penguins of Madagascar, The Cleveland Show), a surface dwelling criminal who seeks dominion of the sea; Gorilla Grodd (Di Maggio in another role), super-intelligent gorilla from Gorilla City seeking revenge over the human race; and many more…
Kanjar Ro
Gentleman Ghost
Fun Haus
Morgaine le Fey
Slug
Chemo
Despero
Terrible Trio
Clock King
Owlman
Honestly, when I watch an episode of Batman: Brave and the Bold it’s a very guilty pleasure. It’s fun to see how cheesy some of the lines can be (deliberately) and how the bad guys inevitably foul up and let the good guys win. These are definitely simplified hero vs. villain stories, but they’re great for kids and adults who want to become kids again for a little while.
Other than the episodes and a game trailer, you don’t get any extras, but that shouldn’t prevent you from enjoying any of the 13 great episodes in this collection.
So if you’ve seen an episode or two and want to catch up or simply want to have a good time, be sure to check out Batman: The Brave and the Bold – Season One – Part One. I’m very excited to see when Part Two comes out so I can enjoy my favorite episode of the series so far – “Mayhem of the Music Meister!” starring Neil Patrick Harris as the Music Meister!
This article first appeared at Blogcritics.org here.
–Fitz
p.s. Pick up Batman: The Brave and the Bold today and enjoy some campy fun!
Rock Slyde aspires to be a noir detective flick in the vein of Raymond Chandler‘s stories or the classic Steve Martin comedy Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid. To say it missed the vein completely and should have been put out of its misery hits a bit closer to the truth.
I think thought Patrick Warburton could do no wrong after such great roles in TV’s Rules of Engagement and The Tick. He’s even funny when you just hear him do his voiceover roles for cartoons – as with Kronk in The Emperor’s New Groove or as the sheriff the recent reboot of Scooby-DooScooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated. Evidently not even Patrick’s brand of funny is the Midas touch.
In Rock Slyde, Warburton plays the title character – Private Detective Rock Slyde. And through the bad jokes, the juvenile sight gags, and the fictitious musical gay porno, it goes downhill from the beginning.
Also appearing in the film are Andy Dick as Bart, the founder of the cult of Bartology; Rena Sofer as femme fatale Sara Lee; Elaine Hendrix as Slyde’s secretary/assistant Judy Bee; Jason Alexander as Mailman Stan, a fan of musical gay pornos; Eric Roberts as Jake the Deliveryman; Lea Thompson as a Master Bartologist; Tom Bergeron as Randy Wonder, the owner of Wonderburger; and Brian Bosworth as “The Friendly Pirate” in the bad pirate porno…
The last time I thought Andy Dick was funny was on NewsRadio in the mid ’90s. His character Bart is a Dr. Evil (Austin Powers) wannabe. Sofer is beautiful and I’ve liked her recent roles as self-assured, powerful women on NCIS and Bones, but her role as a lonely damsel in distress didn’t work. And it’s bad when Tom Bergeron, host of America’s Funniest Home Videos has one of the funnier scenes as a Bartologist firing one of his workers at the burger joint simply because the all mighty Bart tells him to.
It’s not as if there isn’t any talent here. But I’m always amazed when a great cast can’t save a movie. It’s happened before, I know. Not every film can be great. Some can’t even be mediocre. But Rock Slyde proves that actors can’t save a script that simply isn’t funny.
In addition to the movie itself, there’s also a “Behind the Scenes” feature that isn’t much more than numerous clips literally shot behind the scenes of the actors and crew as they filmed the movie. There are a few amusing moments, but nothing that really saves the film.
Ultimately, this movie was a waste of time. Unless you’re into fictitious musical gay pornography, I’d skip Rock Slyde all together. Though I still think Warburton has an amazing gift for comedy, he couldn’t save this movie from itself.
This article first appeared at BlogCritics.org here.
–Fitz
p.s. If you really want to see this film, there’s a link below, but I’d recommend checking out some of Warburton’s other work instead.
The television series based on the comic is being directed by Frank Darabont (The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile, The Mist) and has been in the works for a while now. But up to now (unless you were at Comic Con) you might have missed the trailer (though it’s been going around the internet like wildfire).
Yes, there are survivors of a deadly zombie plague. But like all good zombie stories, it’s less about the monsters themselves but how people deal with them. When the chips are down, how do they react? Do they do what’s right? Or what’s convenient?
The survivors are led by police officer Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) who’s simply looking for somewhere safe to call home. Rick’s wife Lori (Sarah Wayne Callies) and friend Shane (Jon Bernthal) are tagging along. And of course they pick up a few others along the way.
Here’s the trailer. It looks awesome and it’s weird looking forward to Halloween for a change! Be sure to check out the premiere on Sunday, October 31st at 10/9c on AMC.
Most of you know I’m pretty apolitical. If it smells of politics, I’m typically walking the other way. But recently, a few things have ticked me off.
If you don’t want to read further about my minor political and education rant, you might as well stop now… [Hopping on my soap box...]
I’m pretty liberal. And not religious at all. If anything I’m probably an agnostic with atheist leanings. But I believe firmly in the power of humankind to do amazing things for both good, selfish, and evil reasons. My hope is that we as a whole balance out so we’re not tilting to the wrong side, whatever that may be.
So that’s me. You’re entitled to your opinions and beliefs so long as I am also afforded that consideration.
Today I saw that there’s a new political humor book for kids called Democrats are Dumb, A Children’s Guide. The press release states that the book “harmlessly and humorously works on detonating the left-wing landmines the Democratic Party has left lying around in its attempt to indoctrinate us and our children in ‘Socialist Think.’”
Before I get going, let me say that I’m all for political humor. We need it. Politics is absurd under the best of circumstances and we need to keep some perspective.
But… and you felt there was a “but” there, didn’t you… Kids need to form their own opinions based on the history they learn in school and based on observations of the world around them. If they become conservative, liberal, or independent-minded, more power to them. But we shouldn’t urge them to do more than think for themselves.
This kind of Dr. Seuss rhyming sing-song for kids who don’t yet have political opinions of their own is like giving them a loaded gun… One quoted rhyme says…
“Khrushchev said, ‘.without firing a shot.’
To elect more Democrats was a Communist plot.”
I think we could just as easily write a book making fun of the Conservative right wing that is pushing us towards religious intolerance and scientific ignorance depending on who you listen to.
Let’s let our kids be kids. Keep politics out of the equation until they have the facts about history, government by the people for the people as laid out in the U.S. Constitution, and can form opinions of their own in coherent sentences.
I fear that planting sing-song political land mines in their minds too early will backfire like so many other indoctrination techniques wanted by those wanting to influence our youth. Let them think for themselves.
Please avoid “political primers” for kids like Democrats are Dumb.
Douglas Adams is one of my heroes. When he passed away in 2001, it was like losing Jim Henson in 1990 – these great people left us far too soon. In Adams’ case, he left us with the number 42, a resounding “so long and thanks for all the fish,” and a couch stuck impossibly in an apartment staircase. These were but a few of his gifts.
Dirk Gently‘s Holistic Detective Agency and Long, Dark Teatime of the Soul were two of the non-Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy related titles he produce during his career. Both of them (and all of the Hitchhiker’s titles) have stuck with me over the years in ways I couldn’t have fathomed in the beginning…
The Electric Monk from Dirk Gently will forever be my labor saving device. Not having time for faith of my own, I would love to purchase one of these robots for my own purposes. Or, as Adams put it:
“Electric Monks believed things for you, thus saving you what was becoming an increasingly onerous task, that of believing all the things the world expected you to believe.”
I could use this ability today so I wouldn’t have to keep believing that everything will work out on its own accord.
At any rate… where was I? Oh yes…
The BBC it seems is creating a television program based on Dirk Gently and I can’t wait to see it here across the pond. Hopefully BBC America will see fit to share this new program with those of us in the U.S. Until then, we will have to content ourselves with the noise generated turning the pages of our lovingly worn, yellowed page copies of Dirk Gently as we read them to tide us over.
Yes, you may be wondering at the title. Scott Pilgrim (the always amusing Michael Cera) is just this twenty-something rocker in Toronto. The Expendables have a veritable who’s who of action stars – Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Randy Couture, Steve Austin, Terry Crews, and Mickey Rourke. It’s a matter of testosterone vs. style. Not that the big guys don’t have style – but it’s a different world…
You might think this is comparing apples and oranges. And maybe you’re right.
But I was looking forward to both of these flicks for months. Each trailer whet my appetite a little more until I was almost drooling in anticipation… (Ok, not really – hypersalivation isn’t a real problem…) These hit different parts of my movie goals…
Action movies have been hit and miss this year for me. The A-Team was a miss, but The Losers was a hit. The Book of Eli was a hit but Legion did poorly at the box office (though I liked it, I didn’t love it). I hated The Wolfman but loved The Crazies… Even Iron Man 2 was a bit of disappointment.
Though I liked parts of The Expendables (some awesome fight scenes), it lacked much emotional connection… Scott Pilgrim vs. the World on the other hand had me at hello. From the 8-bit style of the Universal logo and theme song to the end, I was enthralled and in geek heaven.
The trifecta of Knives (Ellen Wong), Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), and Cera as Pilgrim worked on so many levels even before you add in the geek. At it’s heart, this story is about the loves and losses of our 20s – those decisions we make and regret that follow us around like lost baggage from the airlines.
But when you add in the amazing soundtrack, the hilarious video game references, and the insanity of a “League of Evil Exes” and you have a film that is transcendent. This is the first truly multi-media inspired film that I can remember that works video game bits directly into the storytelling. I’m sure I missed a bunch of them, but they were seamlessly integrated with the love story.
Is this movie for people under the age of 16? Probably not. Is it for people over 50? Only if they’re extremely hip. This film (and the comic that spawned it) is a generational thing. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and Fast Times at Ridgemont High were products of the generation I grew up in… These were homages to the inanity of growing up in that world of the end of the ’70s and early ’80s in much the same way that Scott Pilgrim captures the music-and-video game generation of today.
So why hasn’t it done well at the box office? Heck if I know. But The Expendables keeps making money based on name recognition.
I can only hope that Scott Pilgrim takes off on DVD & Blu-ray to save itself from total anonymity.
If you haven’t seen either film, I’d see Scott Pilgrim first and The Expendables second. Or the other way. Doesn’t really matter I guess. They both have a lot going for them. But damn I enjoyed the saga of Scott and Ramona so much more…
Unfortunately, because of my limited shipping budget, I can only offer this to United States residents… But all you have to do is leave a comment below and I’ll contact the winner via e-mail on September 20, 2010.
It’s no secret that I’m a huge fan of Simon Pegg & Nick Frost – Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz have to be two of my favorite comedies of the last decade. So when I saw this video of the duo chatting about their time spent working with the legendary Steven Spielberg on Tintin, I LMAO.
Music Review: Red Velvet Car – Heart - Hi again… Nothing beats live music. Hands down, the live experience trumps any audio or video recording I’ve ever seen of an artist performing. That said, the next best thing is a concert recording,... […]
DVD Review: Batman: The Brave and the Bold – Season One – Part One - Hi all! Though I’d seen a few comic books in my youth, my first exposure to the Batman phenomenon was in 1989 when I saw Tim Burton’s Batman on the big screen. From that moment on, Michael Keaton... […]
DVD Review: Rock Slyde - Hi there… Rock Slyde aspires to be a noir detective flick in the vein of Raymond Chandler‘s stories or the classic Steve Martin comedy Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid. To say it missed the vein completely... […]
Halloween 2010, the dead rise on AMC! - Hey all… Yes, I know it’s not even September yet and I’m talking about Halloween – one of my least favorite holidays… But this year will be different. AMC is airing the 90-minute premiere episode of... […]
There used to be an Amazon ad here, but since Amazon and the state of Colorado can't agree on how to handle taxes, they've blocked my affiliate account. From now on or until this is resolved, links to products will be through Barnes and Noble.
It’s no secret that I am extremely enthusiastic about the latest surge in urban fantasy fiction being published. Sometimes my world seems far too antiseptic, purged of the everyday magic I wish was everywhere. To solve this problem, I retreat into fictional worlds where real magic exists on the streets of today’s urban jungle.
