Mary Roach is an author who has been on my radar for a while. I knew about her books, and her particular brand of letting-the-reader-in-on-the-joke writing about non-fiction which I learned when I dove into Packing for Mars earlier this year. So when Audible had a sale of Mary Roach’s books, I looked to see what I wanted to listen to next in her oeuvre (knowing that I already have a library request in for Stiff which is all about the life of cadavers). Bonk: […]
An archaeological dig into suburban life, teenage angst, and death
A startling, depressing, funny, painful glimpse into teenaged angst, The Virgin Suicides is Eugenides’ first novel and well-written but not a comfortable read. If you expect deep psychological insights into the phenomenon of suicide, you’ll be disappointed. Instead, the author reflects on adolescence, loss, regret, and the all too swift passage of time. One learns right from the beginning that the five teenaged daughters of the Lisbon family have all killed themselves, and with that horrifying fact now out in the open, the author proceeds […]
If You Could Stop Time, Wouldn’t You Rob a Bank, Too?
In case you’re not aware, Image Comics has a bunch of amazing ish happening over there right now. Of my four reviews so far (including this one), they’ve all been graphic novels, and only one hasn’t been from Image. Those people know what they’re doing; the stories are all great and the art is phenomenal in basically every Image book you pick up. Over in my blog, I’ve reviewed the first volume of Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky’s Sex Criminals, which is about a girl […]
Tattooed corpses and Muslim fundamentalists prove a heady mix in Thailand
Bangkok detective Sonchai Jitpleecheep of the Royal Thai Police returns in another dramatic, action-packed, and nearly hallucinogenic plot involving tattoo artists, mutilated corpses, golden-hearted whores, hard-bitten police captains, Muslim fundamentalists, and the CIA—all of this against the backdrop of an impoverished nation dependent on drugs and the sex trade for survival and a Buddha-worshipping cop who doesn’t hesitate to bend the rules when necessity and/or his conscience dictates. A strangely brilliant and obsessive CIA operative named Mitch Turner is found murdered in the bed […]
Buddhism, Sex and Snakes: Culture Shock in Thailand
Apparently Bangkok thrillers have a certain notoriety for sensationalism, and Burdett’s Bangkok 8 doesn’t fail in that regard, but it is also so much more. In fact, this noir detective story could be a Phillip Marlowe, if it weren’t for the fact that its hero’s name is a little harder to pronounce. Detective Sonchai Jitpleecheep is the son of a Thai bar girl and a long-gone Vietnam-era American soldier, is a little too comfortable with many of the denizens of Bangkok’s notorious red-light districts, is […]
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