"The Walking Dead" by Mess'rs Kirkman, Adlard and Rathburn: A Book Review

Now these people know how a corpse should behave.  This is actually the second compendium of awesome zombie rotten-ness.  I admit that this series of graphic novels took a while to click with me.  I initially didn't like Adlards art which I now view as nothing short of epic, and the premise I thought was a bit video-game inspired and an not good way.  I do not like the comatose amnesiac protagonist as being creatively lazy.  That aside the question is asked - in a world gone nuts to what ends would you go in order to survive?  And apparently to these three men its a wide open smorgasbord (now there's a Scandinavian innovation I can support!) of human depravity.  Cannibalism, murder, rape, wanton pillaging ... turns out humans are far more disgusting than the undead.  Its layered, complex, and gross all in one - Love It!!

"Handling the Undead" by John Ajvide Lindqvist: A Book Review

Did not care for this book.  Dour, dull Swedes are all the literary rage since "the girl with the dragon tattoo" foisted its boring depressing craptastic writing on an unsuspecting America.  Lindqvist (how droll - spelled with a "qv" rather than a "qu", reinforcing how Swedish this guy really is) is touted as the Scandinavian Stephan King and a "master philosopher of the horror genre."  I always said what the horror genre needed was a philosopher to put all the gory killings in perspective for me.  Enter one John Ajvide Lindqvist.  This book promised a "humanistic take" on zombies; when I think rotting shambling brain munching corpses I think whats missing is the humanism in all the brain eating.  I never thought I'd hate zombies until I read this book.  Be forewarned these zombies get down and...dance.  What!?

"Halfhead" by Stuart B. Mac Bride: A Book Review

A Sci-fi thriller/mystery that claims to be an "International Bestseller."  I always wondered what nebulous criteria must be met to claim that moniker.  I think it must be sheer gall, if you have the nerve to claim it then its yours.  Nothing screamed bestseller to me but I really wasn't disappointed even if you could see the ending broadcast a mile away.  Its an imported book a first edition bound and printed in Great Britain (can't we all agree that the "Great" is long past and it should be simply Britain?).  I wonder what a first edition paperback is worth?  Not much, I'm afraid.  Set in future Glasgow I'm getting a lot of colorful colloquialisms like "sodding," "bloody," and "bollocks," but my favorite being the inscrutable "bamheid" which I believe contextually means "looney."  Its got a decent premise and setting, a truly fearsome female serial killer, and a protagonist that you don't want to kill yourself.  Its also got a very sadistic take on the future of crime and punishment with a brutally heavy focus on the punishment aspect.  It seems criminals (the worst of the worst [hate that phrase!] are subjected to "halfheading" - hence the title.  Man, nothing escapes me!  Half-heading consists of removal of the lower jaw, followed by lobotomizing and retraining to do manual labor.  In the future there are no janitors just goofy looking simple minded criminals.  Apparently this approach has done nothing to lower crime rates as there seems to be a veritable army of creepy looking felons.

Different is Not the Same!

It has become fairly obvious that my external brain is completely unhinged.  She doesn't know the difference between "different" and the "same".  She says that the knee and the neck of a person is the same.  I know the difference between the two and they aren't the same.  She also says something else is the same when I know it is different.  I just forget what that was.  I can't trust her - she's obviously nuts.  Help me, Please call the authorities.

Short Update

Hello - 

I am working, very busy, and very tired.  I have not forgotten my responsibilities to keep posting and updating my life.  Lots of stuff has been happening.  I heard from old friends - (hello Sally) - reading lots of books, wish I had more time for drawing, trying to be proactive in my legal work, and lots of other interesting things.  I am looking forward, hopefully, to a visit from the phrenologist.  Other than that, I am alive and well with nothing to complain about other than the obvious.  I was included in a book recently about adopted Native American children.  The book is called Two Worlds: Lost Children of the Indian Adoption Projects.  You can get a copy from Amazon.  I've only read a little of it.  By all accounts it seems to be very cool.  Plus, my picture is on the cover! 

Until next time - Giigawabamin Nagatch... Lay there then.

Ani

Stuff Wot I Redd (First Book Review Part One)

I like Zombies.  I think that of all the varieties of spooky things they are the best.  Better than weeny love-struck vampires mooning over pale school girls with questionable acting skills, better than basketball playing werewolves.  Zombies at their most basic do one thing:  eat human flesh.  And that's it.  There should be very little deviation from the Canon of Allowable Zombie Behavior which was codified by the master of all things zombie:  George R. Romero.  I'm not saying that I condone it but zombies might be able to move faster than a drunken lurching stagger, and there MIGHT be the zombie-specialists that dine only on human brains.  And that's pretty much it.  It's their simplicity of purpose that makes them so frightening; that feeling that the very idea of the undead might not be all that far-fetched after all. 

I can pretty much go to bed each night assured that no wall crawling creep with a mean jones for my blood is going to skulk into my bedroom, bite my neck, then turn into a bat and flap away into the darkness.  Likewise, there are long odds against lycanthropy; yet there is the very real possibility of the walking dead.  Respected sources, such as the Bible, do more than merely hint at the possibility of the walking dead, they cite chapter and verse.  No pun intended.  Not only did Jesus die then re-animate, the Book of Revelations also talks about how the dead will also come forth from their places of internment.  Science albeit weird science, also seems to think that life after death might be possible; cryogenics deals with revivification.  The possibility of a horrifying end will scare me more than aliens or the outright impossible, and I think that this is true for most people.  It was a stroke of genius that Stephanie Meyer linked vampirism with love.  Personally though I detest the "Twilighting" of the horror genre; it might make for fat bank accounts but it does nothing for me.

I was excited as I've recently been for anything lately hearing about the book, "World War Z" by Max Brooks.  (to be continued)

Guest Blog from Jackie - Response to Anonymous

"Do you have children, Jackie? Picture someone breaking into your house and RAPING your children, or possibly hypothetical children- tell me that person doesn't deserve punishment. Find out that this person has raped before, and has slipped through the system so he could repeat these offenses... OPEN YOUR EYES!"

First, I want to thank you for taking on this very difficult and painful subject and engaging in discussion.  I do have 3 children and 5 grandchildren and have worked hard to be close to them and to care for them.  And it is exactly from this place that I say that Ani does not need punishment in order to become responsible for his actions. 

I think we are both in agreement that the act of sexual violence is a terrible thing and that it does terrible things to people.  I think we are also in agreement that we must do all we can to prevent it from ever being done to anyone, and in particular to anyone that we care about.  It sounds like we are also in agreement that the system we have built to help us to stop this crime from happening is failing to do this and that it needs to work better.  The problem that I see and that I have seen first hand is that punishment does not accomplish this goal.  That is what makes me so sad and frustrated - that we keep doing something that in many cases is making things worse, making us less safe. 

There is much we can learn from Ani's life and one thing I have learned is that punishment has not made him either more safe or more responsible.  We need to look elsewhere to do that and that is where my efforts lie.  With my own children and grandchildren, I see the same thing - punishment does not work to provide them with valuable lessons in anything.  Instead, it makes them angry and hateful and vengeful - not qualities that I want to nurture in them.

Our challenge here is very important.  Yes, we simply MUST open our eyes to what we are doing when we use punishment to attempt to "teach" people to be loving, kind, and responsible to others and to how their actions impact others.  Our system certainly is failing us, and we can do better.  We can change the way we treat offenders.  We can spend more time and  money to find out what has caused them to act this way and to provide them with help to become responsible.  Those who do not or cannot use these services are free to stay in prison.  I see no purpose or value in the way that our current system locks people up for a magic number of years as if they will be somehow magically "cooked" after that number of years.  It is not the number of  years in prison that makes a person into a safe and responsible member of a community, it is what happens to a person during those years.  We spend way too much time and too many legal resources arguing about the number of years a person "gets" and way too little time and money discussing what should be happening to this person and with this person during the time that we are paying for their food, housing, clothing, and care in a state institution.  I guess, from my viewpoint of watching this happen to Ani for the last 30 years, I've had a ring-side seat.

I am not attempting to be "right" in stating my observations and opinions, but only to share what I think and believe to be true.  I welcome this dialog and these challenges and questions.  I think that it is through this kind of discussion that we will build a better world for us and for our children.