DJ, model Paris Hilton has busy international schedule
Hat tip to Fred Zackel.
Saturday, April 25, 2015
Vintage Torch Songs
Vintage Torch Songs: Today marks the birthday of the “Lady of Song,” Ella Fitzgerald. Famous for her silky voice and successful jazz standards, Fitzgerald knew how to bring tears to audiences’ eyes with her achingly beautiful renditions of popular torch songs. In honor of the Queen of Jazz, we’ve rounded up other weep-worthy, sentimental ballads from the 1920s that sing of lost love and other romantic dilemmas we can all relate to.
Stan Burns: R.I.P.
Mystery Fanfare: Stan Burns: R.I.P.
This is sad news, though we knew it was coming. Stan was a friend of mine for many years through our association in DAPA-Em, the amateur press association for fans of crime and mystery fiction. I was also lucky enough to meet him in person at a couple of Bouchercons and to correspond with him a bit through the years. R.I.P., Stan.
This is sad news, though we knew it was coming. Stan was a friend of mine for many years through our association in DAPA-Em, the amateur press association for fans of crime and mystery fiction. I was also lucky enough to meet him in person at a couple of Bouchercons and to correspond with him a bit through the years. R.I.P., Stan.
Friday, April 24, 2015
Richard Corliss, R. I. P.
Variety: Richard Corliss, for 35 years the witty, incisive and compassionate voice on film and culture at Time magazine, died Thursday after a stroke, the magazine announced Friday.
O Canada
Mirror Online: Eight-year-old Sarah Auger from Quebec, Canada, has been told she is no longer allowed to read books on her daily 20-minute bus ride to and from school.
I Miss the Old Days
I saw one of these a few times in Austin in the '60s, and once I even saw it in Town Lake. I don't know if LBJ was the driver, however.
The '60s at 50: 1965: LBJ's Amphicar
The '60s at 50: 1965: LBJ's Amphicar
FFB: The Heirs of Anthony Boucher -- Marvin Lachman
This post originally appeared on September 6, 2005. This is a book that shouldn't be forgotten.Marv Lachman has written a book about mystery fandom that I predict will be on a lot of awards lists next year. In this anecdotal illustrated history, he gives capsule summaries of every Bouchercon (including attendance figures), discusses every mystery fanzine ever published, looks at mystery fandom from its beginnings to the present, and even talks a bit about fannish scholarship and the future of fandom.
For me, reading The Heirs of Anthony Boucher was almost as good as reliving many of the best moments of the last thirty years. When Judy was reading the book last night, she said, "This is like old home week." I think that nails it for those of us who have been fans for many of the years covered in the book.
But The Heirs of Anthony Boucher is certainly more than that. It's an invaluable documentation of the history (so far) of fandom, and it's something that everyone who cares about mysteries, mystery writing, and mystery fandom should own and read. I suggest that you order a copy now. You won't regret it.
Thursday, April 23, 2015
Things Are Different There
Strippers liven up funerals with erotic dancing in China
Hat tip to Art Scott.
Possibly NSFW photos.
Hat tip to Art Scott.
Possibly NSFW photos.
Robots Just Wanna Have Fun
Robot with $100 bitcoin buys drugs, gets arrested: This is the curious story of how a robot armed with a weekly budget of $100 in bitcoin managed to buy Ecstasy, a Hungarian passport and a baseball cap with a built-in camera—before getting arrested.
Hat tip to Tom Neary.
Hat tip to Tom Neary.
Wally Lester, R. I. P.
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Wally Lester, an original member of one of Pittsburgh's most successful and popular groups, The Skyliners, died Tuesday of pancreatic cancer at age 73 in Southport, N.C.
Wednesday, April 22, 2015
Mary Doyle Keefe, R. I. P.
FOX Carolina 21: HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) - Mary Doyle Keefe, the model for Norman Rockwell's iconic 1943 Rosie the Riveter painting that symbolized the millions of American women who went to work on the home front during World War II, has died. She was 92.
The Winter Family -- Clifford Jackman
The Winter family isn't really a family, though in a way you could say they're all related by blood, of which there is a copious quantity in this novel. The family is instead a band of outlaws. They first come together at the end of the Civil War as a group assigned to go out ahead of Sherman on his march through Georgia. Augustus Winter isn't their leader at this point. That title belongs to a Union lieutenant named Quinten Ross, who's a psycho killer, Jan Müller, the Empire brothers, who are stupid and vicious, and Augustus Winter, who turns out to be the most terrifying of them all. Along the way they pick up Lukas Shakespeare and a slave named Fred Johnson. After the war they separate and engage in various depredations, reuniting in Chicago, where Ross' brother needs some help with rigging an election. The scenes in a slaughterhouse are rivaled in their brutality by the saloon fights and battles leading up to the election. Leaving Chicago, the gang separates again and gets back together at various points, including in Oklahoma and Arizona where they engage in bounty hunting and scalping Indians. Winter frightens even the members of his family. "It is often observed that murderers do not look like murderers. No one said that of Augustus Winter." His very appearance on the scene causes men to wet their pants. (I do wish that Jackman had avoided saying at one point, "Winter is coming." Since that's been used as the tagline of a well-known TV series, it seems a little out of place, although it has something of the same significance.)
Some readers might be reminded of the work of Cormac McCarthy, specifically of Blood Meridian, but I kept thinking about Flannery O'Connor's Misfit from "A Good Man Is Hard to Find," who says, " . . . it's nothing for you to do but enjoy the few minutes you got left the best way you can – by killing somebody or burning down his house or doing some other meanness to him. No pleasure but meanness, . . ." Pretty much everybody in this novel has that attitude, except for Winter, who never seems to find pleasure even in the killing.
The scary thing about the novel is that as Winter and the family move westward, they aren't so much the last of the frontier but the harbingers of the civilization that's replacing them. The Winter Family is a gripping story that's full of blood, terror, and violence. "Enjoyment" might not be the right word for what I felt, but the book is a great read.
25 Novels That Will Turn You Into an Environmentalist
Best Environmental Novels: 25 Novels That Will Turn You Into an Environmentalist
Who Says TV Is Out of Ideas?
‘Galaxy Quest’ Series Headed To Television: Other movie titles from the Paramount catalogue that the studio’s TV division is turning into series with the original auspices include straight-to-series comedy School Of Rock at Nickelodeon, with the film’s director Richard Linklater and producer Scott Rudin; drama Shooter, which has a pilot order at USA, with the movie’s star Mark Wahlberg producing; as well as a Shutter Island series for HBO with Martin Scorsese that is among Pat TV’s projects in development. Additionally, Paramount TV is co-producing the Minority Report Fox pilot, which is considered likely to go to series.
Tuesday, April 21, 2015
Sally of the Wasteland -- Victor Gischler
Victor Gischler puts Sally and her friends into some terrible situations as they make their way through a post-apocalyptic wasteland as monsters attack, blood flows, and heads roll. Okay, mostly they fly through the air, but why quibble? There are mutant cannibals, too, and Bamazons. I liked the Bamazons best. You might find yourself wondering who's going to die next, not to mention how. Gischler is nothing if not creative when it comes to devising deaths. Dandy artwork by Tazio Bettin adds a lot to the wild doings. Don't pass this book along to your maiden aunt.
The Computer Had It Coming
Yahoo News Canada: Police in Colorado have cited a 37-year-old man for carrying his computer into an alley then shooting it eight times with a handgun after what authorities said had been a long battle with the uncooperative machine.
Frederic Morton, R. I. P.
LA Times: U.S. writer Frederic Morton, who became internationally recognized in part through books on the Austrian homeland that he was forced to flee because of the Holocaust, has died, his Austrian publishers said Monday. He was 90.
He Does Believe!
Dan Aykroyd tells HuffPost Show hosts he has seen four UFOs, is a 'believer'
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
It's San Jacinto Day!
179 years ago Tuesday, General Santa Anna surrendered to General Sam Houston at San Jacinto: Tuesday, Texans all over the world will be remembering the events of April 21, 1836 where in a prairie near what would one day be La Porte, the Lone Star State took its next step into legend.
Betty Willis, R. I. P.
NY Daily News: LAS VEGAS — The woman who came up with a neon sign that has welcomed countless visitors to "fabulous Las Vegas" since 1959 has died.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Overlooked Movies -- The Ninth Gate
This is another repeat, written back in 2007 before this meme began. The movie was mentioned elsewhere lately, and I was reminded of this post, so I figured it would fit in nicely here. I still haven't read Club Dumas, the book on which the movie is based.George Kelley recommended this movie to me. It slipped by me completely on its original release, and I didn't even know that it had to do with rare books and book collectors. So I was glad to catch up with it on DVD.
Johnny Depp, doing his usual excellent job, plays a book dealer with questionable ethics. (I refuse to make any jokes here.) He's hired by Boris Balkan (Frank Langella) to compare his copy of a very rare book to the only two remaining copies. The book has an interesting history, and it begins to seem that the certain illustrations might have been done by Lucifer, whose work appears on different pages in each copy. Put all his engravings together, and what do you get? That's for Langella to know and for Depp to find out.
In some ways this is an effective horror movie, a lot more interesting to me than any number of variations on the old "how many buckets of fake blood can we use" pictures around these days. The book collecting aspects are especially appealing, and Depp's detective work is often engrossing. He's not an appealing character even at the beginning, and he becomes a much worse person as the plot thickens. Along the way he's assisted by a woman who may (or may not) be Lucifer in earthly form. (And not a bad form at all, I must say.)
So what's not to like? Well, the parts that are good in themselves don't add up to an entirely successful whole. The occult sex club wasn't creepy or effective, and the ending didn't satisfy me, though it might have impressed me more if I'd been sure what it meant. Overall, the movie's certainly worth a look, especially if you like books.
Monday, April 20, 2015
Robert Rietti, R. I. P.
Hollywood Reporter: Robert Rietti, “The Man of a Thousand Voices” who dubbed for several James Bond villains and uttered every single Orson Welles line heard in the 1972 film Treasure Island, died April 3, The Times of London reported. He was 92.
Hat tip to Jeff Segal.
Hat tip to Jeff Segal.
This Is Your FBI
FBI overstated forensic hair matches in nearly all trials before 2000: Of 28 examiners with the FBI Laboratory’s microscopic hair comparison unit, 26 overstated forensic matches in ways that favored prosecutors in more than 95 percent of the 268 trials reviewed so far, . . .
They Want to Believe!
Couple believe they're having a close encounters with low-flying aliens: Linda Deaton and David Fay said they were certain aliens are hovering above their north Dublin home but they couldn’t capture any footage because their technology jams while the aliens are floating about.
Sunday, April 19, 2015
Ben Powers, R. I. P.
'Good Times' actor Ben Powers dies at 64: NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — Actor Alton "Ben" Powers, known for his role in the 1970s CBS television series Good Times, has died at the age of 64.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Free for Kindle for a Limited Time
Adventures of Cash Laramie and Gideon Miles (Cash Laramie & Gideon Miles Series Book 1) - Kindle edition by Edward A. Grainger. Literature & Fiction Kindle eBooks @ Amazon.com.: Adventures of Cash Laramie and Gideon Miles is a short story collection of eight rousing, noir Western tales with a hardboiled edge. In 1880s Wyoming Territory, two Deputy U.S. Marshals find themselves on the outside of societal norms. Cash Laramie, raised by the Arapahos, is known as The Outlaw Marshal for his unorthodox conduct toward criminals and his cavalier approach to life. Gideon Miles, one of the first African Americans in the marshal service, is honorable, fearless, and unrivaled in his skills with guns, knives, and tracking.
These independent, resourceful lawmen develop a bond, establishing a formidable defense in a wayward land where good and wicked is often hard to distinguish and life is as cheap as a two-bit game of poker.
James Bond And The Fall Of The British Empire
James Bond And The Fall Of The British Empire: For Ian Fleming, creator of James Bond, the spectacular collapse of the British Empire after the Second World War was like a bereavement. It even followed -- almost to the letter -- the classic sequence of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and, finally, acceptance.
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