Tuesday, February 21, 2017
First It Was the Thin Mints Melee
Cops: Suspect Used Sex Toy During Attack: A Florida man punched his girlfriend and struck her with a “plastic dildo” when she criticized his performance as they were having sex, police allege.
Overlooked Movies -- And Then There Were None (1945)
The first Agatha Christie novel I ever read was Ten Little Indians which was originally published with a more offensive title and which later became And Then There Were None. I was 11 or 12 years old, and I thought it was terrific. Later on I saw the 1965 film in the theater, which is a lot different from the book and which, as it turns out, is also quite a bit different from the 1945 version, which, in turn, is different from the stage play. I liked the 1965 film when I saw it, though, and you can't go wrong with a movie that has Fabian in it. but the point is that while it's fairly famous, and while all of you have probably seen it, I'd overlooked the 1945 movie until now. As you can see on the poster to the left, the cast is top notch: Barry Fitzgerald, Walter Huston, Louis Hayward, Roland Young, June Duprez, Mischa Auer, C. Aubrey Smith, Judith Anderson, Richard Haydn and Queenie Leonard No Fabian, though. René Clair directed, and the movie turned out to be a big hit.
I'm sure you know the setup. Eight people, none of whom have ever met before, are ferried to a deserted island. They've been invited by U.N. Owen. When they arrive at the only house on the island, they're greeted by two servants, but there's no sign of Mr. Owen. A recording is played and each of the guests is accused of murder or of having contributed to someone's death. So are the servants.
You know the rest. There's no way off the island for several days, and guests begin dying it ways mentioned in the "Ten Little Indians" rhyme. So who's behind it all? Who will live and who will die? If you've read the book, you might not get the answer to both of those right, since the ending has been "Hollywooded" a bit, but it's still fun to watch the cast go through their paces and to see the cleverness of the murderer. And to try to guess who it is, though that's not as hard as you might think. A very entertaining movie, and I'm glad I finally saw it.
Monday, February 20, 2017
Dick Bruna, R. I. P.
The Two-Way : NPR: Miffy the rabbit seems quite simple. Two black dots for eyes, a sideways X for a mouth, a body inked in gentle curves — the artistry of Dick Bruna's creation rests precisely in its apparent artlessness. And in the six decades since Miffy was first put to page, Bruna's venerable rabbit has earned the affection of young fans worldwide, the admiration of art critics and even an entire museum in her honor.
Hat tip to Deb.
Hat tip to Deb.
In Loco Presidentis: Who's In Charge Here?
Neatorama: It seems like a necessary and not terribly difficult thing to do—make sure someone is always running the country. But it took U.S. lawmakers nearly 200 years to get most of the kinks out of the presidential succession process. Not until the 25th Amendment to the Constitution was passed in 1967 was the procedure for replacing an incapacitated president clarified. So what happened before that? Well, the government sort of made things up as it went along.
Bonus FFB on Monday: The Butcher's Wife --Owen Cameron
Owen Cameron seems to be a genuinely forgotten writer, although he had considerable success. The Butcher's Wife was recommended to me by Bill Pronzini, so I knew it would be a good one. Sure enough, it was.Harry Grass is a game warden who's not satisfied in his marriage. Part of the problem is his baby son, who doesn't please Grass as babies are supposed to please new parents. One day Grass sees a man who seems familiar leaving a parked car and acting suspicious. Grass checks out the car and finds bloodstains. When the trunk of the car is opened, two dismembered bodies are found inside.
It turns out that the man Grass saw is the husband of Grass' old flame, and it also turns out that Grass finds that the old flame still attracts him. Before long there's a manhunt, and Grass, although he's a game warden, gets involved. The result is a police procedural with the added interest of what Grass will do about his own situation. The conclusion isn't what I was expecting.
Cameron writes economical prose and leavens his dark story with humor. I'll have to check out some of his other books to see if they're as good as this one.
What Is Presidents Day?
What Is Presidents Day?: History: What are we celebrating on the holiday known as 'Presidents Day'? Is it really a holiday?
Sunday, February 19, 2017
Richard Schickel, R. I. P.
Variety: Richard Schickel, the longtime film critic for Time magazine who also wrote 37 books, mostly on film, and directed a number of documentaries on film subjects, died on Saturday in Los Angeles of complications from a series of strokes, his family told the Los Angeles Times. He was 84.
Clyde Stubblefield, R. I. P.
The New York Times: It took only 20 seconds for Clyde Stubblefield to drum his way to immortality. They came near the end of James Brown’s “Funky Drummer,” recorded in a Cincinnati studio in late 1969. Brown counts him in — “1, 2, 3, 4. Hit it!” — and Mr. Stubblefield eases into a cool pattern, part bendy funk and part hard march. It’s calm, slick and precise, and atop it, Brown asks over and over, “Ain’t it funky?”
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Saturday, February 18, 2017
Blonde's Requiem -- James Hadley Chase
Stark House has been doing a good many double-deckers of novels by James Hadley Chase, and I thought I'd mention a couple of them here. One is He Won't Need It Now/The Dead Stay Dumb, with a sterling introduction by Rick Ollerman. The other is Just the Way It Is/Blonde's Requiem, with another fine intro by Greg Shepard. As it happens, both introductions mention that Raymond Chandler was unhappy about what appeared to be that book's plagiarism of some of his work. It's hard to find any information about this on the internet other than the fact that Chase was force to make an apology in print. So I decided to read Blonde's Requiem and see if I could spot any similarities.The short answer is "no," other than something I noticed on the first few pages of the book. Chase has nothing of Chandler's style, and certainly the first-person narrator, Marc Spewak, bears no resemblance to Philip Marlowe. He's not much of a detective, and he gets scared all too often. He's in the town of Cranville, hired by a man named Wolf, who wants to be mayor. Three young women have disappeared, and Wolf believes that if they can be found alive or dead, he can with the office he craves. The town is supposedly crooked, although we don't see much evidence of that. One of the other candidates has hired a woman p.i. to look into the disappearances, as the cops appear to be doing nothing. Spewak keeps telling everyone he can find the women and break the town wide open, but that's mostly wishful thinking on his part.
The woman p.i. is a good character and gets the best of Spewak quite often, even physically. She knows jiu-jitsu, and he doesn't. Chase moves things right along, as he always does, but the solution to the disappearances comes more or less out of left field and has little to do with what's gone before. None of this is up to the level of Chandler, or even very close. It's lightweight fun, and if that's what you're looking for, these four books are good places to find it.
On This Day in 1930, Clyde Tombaugh Discovered Pluto
Mental Floss: On February 18, 1930, amateur astronomer Clyde Tombaugh discovered "Planet X" using an astrograph, which is essentially a space camera. Planet X was soon named Pluto, and the rest is a nerd battle of historical proportions.
Once Again Texas Leads the Way
Ms. Pearl – Cedar Creek, Texas The world's largest squirrel statue clutches a pecan bigger than your head.
Friday, February 17, 2017
Warren Frost, R. I. P.
Twin Peaks' Warren Frost Dead at 91: Frost passed away Friday following a long illness, Showtime confirmed in a statement. He played Dr. Will Hayward, the coroner who refused to perform Laura Palmer’s autopsy, on the original ABC run of Twin Peaks, and came out of retirement to reprise the role in Showtime’s upcoming revival. (Frost’s son Mark is a co-creator of Twin Peaks.)
George 'The Animal' Steele, R. I. P.
abc7ny.com: Steele turned pro in 1967 and was best known for his run as a comical babyface attraction in the final years before his 1988 retirement. With his hairy upper body, bald head and green tongue, Steele became one of the most recognizable characters for the WWE -- then known as WWF -- during its national expansion in the mid-1980s, thanks to his penchant for biting open and chewing on the turnbuckle pads.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
An Old Friend Comes to Texas
Not so very long ago I wrote this post about an old friend of mine, Bob Tyus. Bob lives in Spokane now, but he and his wife are on their annual "get out of Washington for the winter tour," which this year brings them to Texas for the first time in decades. Luckily enough he stayed for a while near Houston. One of our high-school classmates organized a little mini-reunion lunch in Spring, Texas, and I got to see Bob again. That's Bob on the left, and bald me next to him. Kay and John Black are the couple on the right. John's another great friend, and I should write about him one of these days. We had Italian food, talked nonstop, and a good time was had by all.
Take a tour through Americana music history
Play Paul Simon's Piano or Croon Into Elvis' Mic at These Seven Historic Recording Studios: Take a tour through Americana music history
Cynthia: John Lennon's First Wife
Cynthia: John Lennon's First Wife: If ever there was a case of opposites attracting, it was the case when a teenage John Lennon lost his heart to Cynthia Powell.
Where The . . . .
Where The: ‘The’ has its place. That, more or less, is the theme of Glenda Browne’s treatise called “The Definite Article: Acknowledging ‘The’ in Index Entries.”1
The ‘The’ article appears in The Indexer, the information- and fun-packed publication for professional indexers everywhere. The Indexer has its own index, which includes an entry for ‘Browne, Glenda.’
The ‘The’ article appears in The Indexer, the information- and fun-packed publication for professional indexers everywhere. The Indexer has its own index, which includes an entry for ‘Browne, Glenda.’
Junie Morrison, R. I. P.
Junie Morrison, P-Funk and Ohio Players Member, Dead at 62: Multi-instrumentalist played pivotal roles in both groups, helping them reach notable chart peaks
FFB: Elegy Beach -- Stephen Boyett
This is as close as it comes to Evil Children in my reading this year. The villain, while not a child, is at least a young man with childlike delusions of changing the world and a very dangerous guy.
A long time ago I read Stephen Boyett's Ariel and liked it a lot. Twenty-five years after writing that one, Boyett wrote a sequel, Elegy Beach. I hoped to find some of the same kind of magic in it that I'd found in Ariel, but it wasn't there for me. Maybe it's not the book. Maybe I've changed.
The setting of both books is a changed world. For whatever reason, technology no longer works. Magic does. There are strange creatures and dangers. There are unicorns. Ariel is one of them, and in the first book the unicorn teams up with Pete Garey in a quest/coming of age story. In Elegy Beach, Pete's in his 40s, living in California, and dealing with his difficult son, Fred, who, with his friend Yan, is trying to learn to control magic, to make it into a kind of technology that will help people get their world back in order. As it turns out, Yan wants to do even more, and he becomes the villain of the piece. Fred, Pete, and Yan's father go after him to stop him before he unmakes the world, and the book becomes another quest, which Ariel shows up and joins.
The tone of this one's a lot darker than Ariel, and I thought it was too long with some of the set pieces extended way beyond their limits. I did like the climactic scenes in the remains of the Hearst Castle, but again I thought they went on a bit too long. I wasn't disappointed in the book, but I didn't like it as much as I wanted to.
Thursday, February 16, 2017
PimPage: An Occasional Feature in Which I Call Attention to Books of Possible Interest
![AR-I-E'CH AND THE SPELL OF CTHULHU: AN INFORMAL GUIDE TO R.E. HOWARD'S LOVECRAFTIAN FICTION by [Blosser, Fred]](https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51RQwz6cAnL.jpg)
AR-I-E'CH AND THE SPELL OF CTHULHU: AN INFORMAL GUIDE TO R.E. HOWARD'S LOVECRAFTIAN FICTION - Kindle edition by Fred Blosser. Literature & Fiction Kindle eBooks @ Amazon.com. AR-I-E’CH AND THE SPELL OF CTHULHU: AN INFORMAL GUIDE TO R.E. HOWARD’S LOVECRAFTIAN FICTION provides a new reference to Robert E. Howard's classic tales of the Cthulhu Mythos and related horror fantasies inspired by the chilling cosmic vision of H.P. Lovecraft. Included are an introductory overview of Howard, Lovecraft, and the Mythos; summaries and discussions of the stories; a short essay on the associations between the Cthulhu Mythos and Howard's most celebrated heroic-fantasy character; a catalog of Howard's signature additions to the Mythos (persons, places, sinister books, and gods); and a selected reading list. Fred Blosser is a veteran commentator on the fiction of Robert E. Howard, published in THE HOWARD COLLECTOR, THE DARK MAN, AMRA, and Marvel Comics magazines based on Howard's characters. He has also published in CINEMA RETRO, THE DARK SIDE, THE ARMCHAIR DETECTIVE, MYSTERY SCENE, and other magazines about the fantasy, horror, and detective genres.
Bobby Freeman, R. I. P.
The New York Times: Bobby Freeman, whose “Do You Want to Dance” climbed the pop charts in 1958 and endured long afterward in covers by the Beach Boys, the Ramones, Bette Midler and others, died on Jan. 23 at his home in Daly City, Calif. He was 76.
The cause was a heart attack, his son Robert Freeman Jr. said on Monday. The death had not been widely reported.
Mr. Freeman was still a teenager when he wrote and recorded the song that became his signature. Sung with infectious enthusiasm and featuring a driving Latin rhythm and a joyful guitar solo, “Do You Want to Dance” reached No. 5 on the Billboard singles chart.
The cause was a heart attack, his son Robert Freeman Jr. said on Monday. The death had not been widely reported.
Mr. Freeman was still a teenager when he wrote and recorded the song that became his signature. Sung with infectious enthusiasm and featuring a driving Latin rhythm and a joyful guitar solo, “Do You Want to Dance” reached No. 5 on the Billboard singles chart.
Bonus FFB on Thursday: Yellow Dog Contract -- Ross Thomas
I've read all Ross Thomas's books (including those he wrote as Oliver Bleeck) once, many of them twice, and some of them three times. I'm never disappointed. My most recent reread was Yellow Dog Contract, in which Harvey Longmire is called on to investigate the disappearance of Arch Mix, head of a powerful union, and write an article giving his opinion of what happened. Longmire is retired from running political campaigns, working with unions, and "doing this and that" in Europe, among other things. He now lives on a farm with his wife, writes greeting card verses, and is happy. Longmire takes the assignment, and of course things don't go well. People start dying, for one thing, and Longmire and two associates whom he knows from former days find themselves on the trail of a vast conspiracy leading up to the presidential election of 1976. They aren't quite sure what the conspiracy is, but they know it's going to spell big trouble for one party when the election comes. The title is a clue.
Great writing, great characters, humor, tricky plotting -- this one has it all. It's no wonder that Thomas is one of my very favorite writers. Highly recommended.
Wednesday, February 15, 2017
Thieves Steal Over 160 Rare Books in Major Heist
The Fine Books Blog: In the early morning hours of January 30, a gang of thieves, in a carefully coordinated scheme, broke into a warehouse near London’s Heathrow airport and made off with over £2 million in rare books. The books, belonging to three different rare book dealers, were being shipped to the United States for the 50th Annual California International Antiquarian Book Fair this past weekend.
Bonus FFB on Wednesday: Valley of the Assassins -- Ian MacAlister (Marvin H. Albert)
I've mentioned before, I'm sure, that I think Ian MacAlister is one of the great pseudonyms of all time, and it belongs to Marvin H. Albert. What I might not have mentioned is what a dandy book Valley of the Assassins is. It's an old-fashioned adventure novel updated for modern times (1975). The book couldn't be written now because the setting is Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Oman, and the current modern times are very different from those of 1975.Eric Larson is an adventurer with a boat, and when he rescues the victim of a wreck in the Persian Gulf, he comes into possession of a map that supposedly leads to the great treasure of the Order of the Assassins, a cult that died out long ago. Or did it?
There are a good many others who'd like to get their hands on the map, which comes complete with strange symbols and riddles. Larson puts together a small team to go after the treasure, but the authorities are in pursuit. Still, he and the team manage to slip out of Iran, get to Oman, and cross into Arabia to the Rub-al-Khali, the Empty Quarter, the largest sand desert in the world.
One of the best things about the novel is the settings and the immense amount of detail that Albert uses to describe them. He puts the reader right there in the streets of Basra, in the border country, and in the sands of the Rub-al-Khali. He's also great at the details of the political situation, the way the police operate, and many other things. Reading this stuff is pure fun.
There's treachery and danger aplenty, too, and some nicely described battles in the desert. The problems of desert travel are bad enough without having people trying to kill you. Great stuff, and highly recommended.
Tuesday, February 14, 2017
Overlooked Movies -- Scared Stiff
Why, you may be asking yourself, would anybody remake Ghostbreakers, which was a funny Bob Hope vehicle? It must have seemed like a good idea at the time, but the result isn't a better movie. It's just a Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis movie.I'm sure I've confessed my love of Dean and Jerry before. I thought they were great on TV and in their early movies. Some of Jerry's antics in this one are still funny to me, but I'm probably the only one.
The story's this: Lizabeth Scott has inherited a scary old dark house in the Caribbean. Through a ridiculous series of events, Dean and Jerry stow away on the ship that's taking her there, and Dean becomes romantically involved with her. There are, naturally, musical numbers, and we get to see Jerry in Carmen Miranda drag. So that's a plus. The events in the old dark house aren't scary at all, though they probably seemed scary enough to me when I saw this as a kid, and we do get to see Lizabeth Scott in a bathing suit, so that's another plus. There's an unnecessary cameo at the end, and it seemed funny to me in the long ago. Not so much now.
This isn't my favorite Martin and Lewis picture. It was barely okay, but it's no Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla.
Monday, February 13, 2017
How We Forgot the Bobbed Haired Bandit
How We Forgot the Bobbed Haired Bandit: In the 1920s, the armed robber Celia Cooney unintentionally became a symbol for the women's movement.
Song of the Day
Just as I remember where I bought certain books or associate books with a certain time and place, I remember the first time I heard certain songs or associate them with a time and a place. What I remember about this one is that I was in the back seat of a beige 1954 Pontiac being driven east on Titus Street in Mexia, Texas, about a block from the elementary school one night in the summer of 1958. Margaret Stubbs was the driver, and the car belonged to her parents. I don't remember who else was in the car, but the radio was tuned to some AM station that wasn't coming in too well. Probably nobody else was listening to the music, but I always did, even if with only half an ear. When this song came on, I was electrified. I practically jumped into the front seat to get to the radio knobs and turn up the volume. I yelled at everyone to be quiet so I could hear it. They thought I was crazy, which I probably was (and am), but they let me listen. I bought the 45 rpm recording of the song as soon as I could. I still have it, and I still love the song.
Robin Luke - Susie Darlin' (1958) - YouTube:
Robin Luke - Susie Darlin' (1958) - YouTube:
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