AUDIBLE: Angels and Demons

Angels and Demons (Unabridged)
Author: Dan Brown
Narrator: Richard Poe
Unabridged fiction - abridged edition available here
Audio Length: 18 hours and 15 min.

This is a prequel to the Da Vinci Code (I listened to this unabridged as well, though it had a different narrarator - I don't blame him if he didn't want to spend another block of his life doing another unabridged book. That's a lot of reading.)
Dan Brown is a mass market author, it is evident in his editing, in his hyping of points that are incindiary within our society - frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if he started out as a journalist for a tabloid. Buzz words he throws into the mix right after he finishes giving a rational explanation for something pissed me off. In this particular case, he had just finished explaining the origin of the judeo-christian concept of 'Satan' as a derivation of the Arabic word 'shitan', meaning adversary. So saying this he immediately describe a certain organization as a "satanic cult", which has a different connotation than what he just finished explaining in what I can only assume is a vehicle for inciting hysteria for the story line which lacks the proper amount of drama anyway.
Cheap tricks like this are what disgust me about the media - but that's another essay altogether (a curse on you William Randolph Hearst.)
Lame and trite devices like this aside, I do like the fact that Brown really does his homework. (the christians really hate it when you do that... they've already come out with a rebuttal of the DaVinci Code. Its mostly fiction y'all. His goddess facts are right, as are a great deal of the history of the church, but the whole other plotline thing has not been substantiated. I didn't want to put spoilers for those who haven't read this yet.)
The story isn't really what I have a problem with... I see definite archetypes in the two books of Brown's that I have read; and that distracts me from losing myself in the book.
Langdon is the accidental hero. Sure, he's smart, but he's painfully naive for someone who has studied extensively the world's religions in their own setting... and for a guy who it is alluded to that women fling themselves at him regularly, he comes across as a vaguely prudish guy.
Vittoria, the girly protagonist of the book, also is purported to be a wily and brilliant scientist, and yet makes errors in judgement and does things painfully alien to the female species (of which I am well acquainted... 'cause I am one.) Its one of the obvious things that Dan Brown does not do well...he's not a woman and doesn't know how they think.
A few more archetypes round out the story: serious bad guy (black and white thinking), questionable law enforcement type who you can't decide is good or bad - but he invariably is arrogant about his ability to know all and the rich and wordly (almost unbelievably so) older patriarch figure and the bait and switch of what I can only assume he means to be a clever ruse.
These are the same complaints I had in Da Vince Code. At least he is consistent.
I could take all of this with a grain of salt, but when they add the narration to the mix, I start laughing. I'm sure Richard Poe has done voice work for cartoons. The evil bad guy became even more of a caricature, when Langdon speaks, his inner monologue is overly innocent and the women's voice?... nope... I couldn't get past that.
Mostly what it reminds me of is the old Speed Racer cartoons. In fact, at times in traffic, I would yell out "No! Trixie! No!" or "Oh, Speed!" then laugh so hard I had to go back and hear what happened in the narrative again. (sometimes I involuntarily got the porn re-mix of the Speed Racer theme in my head... but that is another matter. =;) )
...and of course, I am completely cynical, so I see conspiracies everywhere...
You can read the paperback version of this book or buy the Audible.com version if you just don't have time to read. (or listen to it if you just really need the comic relief or don't have a strong sense of snarkiness.)

Publisher's Summary: An ancient secret brotherhood. A devastating new weapon of destruction. An unthinkable target...
World-renowned Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon is summoned to a Swiss research facility to analyze a cryptic symbol seared into the chest of a murdered physicist. What he discovers is unimaginable: a deadly vendetta against the Catholic Church by a centuries-old underground organization - the Illuminati. Desperate to save the Vatican from a powerful time bomb, Langdon joins forces in Rome with the beautiful and mysterious scientist Vittoria Vetra. Together they embark on a frantic hunt through sealed crypts, dangerous catacombs, deserted cathedrals, and the most secretive vault on earth...the long-forgotten Illuminati lair.
©2003 Dan Brown; (P)2003 Simon & Schuster Inc. All Rights Reserved. AUDIOWORKS is an imprint of Simon & Schuster Audio Division, Simon & Schuster Inc.

AUDIBLE: Pattern Recognition

Pattern Recognition (Unabridged)
Author: William Gibson
Narrator: Shelly Frasier
Unabridged Fiction
Audio Length: 10 hours and 7 min.

I actually read this book before I got it on Audible (and I still have it on my bookshelf in hardback).
I've read a bunch of good and bad reviews (they seem to be polarized-its either really good or really bad) and I can identify with most of their points. Yes, there are plot holes, yes there are issues that normally wouldn't magically work themselves out like they do here and some splintering of the story takes place with characters that normally would have been more important... normally, I say, because your average novelist follows an established framework.
Gibson does not.
His splinter characters do contribute to the mood, and to the aura of Cayce and her unreal labors. It worked for me.
But, continuing in its defense, there are also avalanches of words that are beautifully written (the first paragraph knocked my sock off); their reading hypnotic. On a personal level, there were so many references that trigger things which instantly made me sympathetic to this book and Cayce.
The whole discussion of jetlag resonates with me and my own travels. Cayce continues to deal with her father's disappearance in the Sept. 11 attacks, and while I am far removed from New York, I have special people in New York City who's loss would have simply devastated me. So many little coalescences that make me sympathetic to this character.

Publisher's Summary: Cayce Pollard is an expensive, spookily intuitive market-research consultant. In London on a job, she is offered a secret assignment: to investigate some intriguing snippets of video that have been appearing on the Internet. An entire subculture of people is obsessed with these bits of footage, and anybody who can create that kind of brand loyalty would be a gold mine for Cayce's client. But when her borrowed apartment is burgled and her computer hacked, she realizes there's more to this project than she had expected.
Still, Cayce is her father's daughter, and the danger makes her stubborn. Win Pollard, ex-security expert, probably ex-CIA, took a taxi in the direction of the World Trade Center on September 11 one year ago, and is presumed dead. Win taught Cayce a bit about the way agents work. She is still numb at his loss, and, as much for him as for any other reason, she refuses to give up this newly weird job, which will take her to Tokyo and on to Russia. With help and betrayal from equally unlikely quarters, Cayce will follow the trail of the mysterious film to its source, and in the process will learn something about her father's life and death.
2003 William Gibson; (P)2004 Tantor Media, Inc.

MOVIES: Jaws

Jaws
Stephen Speilberg

Yes, this is the movie that kept me out of the deep end of the swimming pool as a child and out of the surf as an adult. I probably shouldn't have watched it over 400 times, but its morbidly fascinating and Richard Dreyfuss just cracks me up in this movie...he reminds me of my dad.

"Amazon review: The story of a Long Island town whose summer tourist business is suddenly threatened by great-white-shark attacks on humans bypasses the potboiler trappings of Benchley's book and goes straight for the jugular with beautifully crafted, crowd-pleasing sequences of action and suspense supported by a trio of terrific performances by Roy Scheider (as the local sheriff), Richard Dreyfuss (as a shark specialist), and particularly Robert Shaw (as the old fisherman who offers to hunt the shark down). The sequences on Shaw's boat--as the three of them realize that in fact the shark is hunting them--are what entertaining moviemaking is all about. --Marshall Fine"

MUSIC: Us

Us
Peter Gabriel

Peter Gabriel hypnotizes me with this album whenever I listen to it... and as my friend Douglas says "I get depressed when I listen to Peter Gabriel albums because I know that its gonna be another 5 years before he releases another one."
One of the things I really love about this album, aside from all the music, all the lyrics, the total effort and Peter Gabriel's voice (isn't that enough?) is the ten pieces of art that are associated with each song on the album. (They are all printed in the dust jacket if you want to see them)
When I first heard the album I was going through a really nasty breakup, so lots of songs spoke to me, but this one just took what was left of my heart and ripped it out and stomped all over it. Guaranteed gut stomper. Apparently, Peter Gabriel wrote this after ending a really long relationship himself. These are the lyrics from "Washing of the Water" that just killed me the first time I heard them:

"Letting go, it's so hard
The way it's hurting now
To get this love untied
So tough to stay with thing
'Cause if I follow through
I face what I denied
I get those hooks out of me
And I take out the hooks that I sunk deep in your side
Kill that fear of emptiness, loneliness I hide"

This is also one of those albums that I will listen to over and over. The whole album is a cohesive effort instead of 12 songs on a piece of plastic...go get this one...its a definite basic-just like that little black dress they always rave about.

Song List:
(my favorites are in italics)

1. Come Talk To Me
2. Love To Be Loved
3. Blood Of Eden
4. Steam
5. Only Us
6. Washing Of The Water
7. Digging In The Dirt
8. Fourteen Black Paintings
9. Kiss That Frog
10. Secret World

MUSIC: Dusk

Dusk
The The

This particular album pushes ALL of my buttons.
It hits into the dark recesses of my psyche and says "I've got your number, fredlet." Frankly, its a bit scary. But it also holds a fascination for me like a shark swimming past you in the ocean...you want to look away, yet you can't.

The [Helpline Operator], the intimate stranger, asks you to:

"Put your tongue into the mouthpiece
and whisper in my ear
admit to me the things you can't admit yourself
admit to me and no one else

Everybody's looking for someone
to tell them what they want to hear
Everyone is looking for true love
to help them feel what you cannot feel."

Matt Johnson's voice ranges from a confidential tenor to a growly roar as he belts out the chorus. Purposeful distortion in the recording distances you from the person that you actually want to confess your personal shadows... hypnotic to say the very least.

Though, the parts of the album that grab me are the songs that plea for help. If you view the album as a cohesive whole, you never know from which delusion that Matt Johnson is suffering. Is he begging for a release from his jaded antipathy? [Bluer Than Midnight]

"save me. save me. Save me.
the candles are lit
the curtains are drawn
there's still no sign of rain or dawn
our lips touch
our limbs entwine
but the ghosts that haunt me
won't leave my mind
save me. save me. Save me.
from myself...

...I ask myself why can love ever touch my heart like fear does?"

[This is the Night]

"how many whores have walked through that door?
lain by my side and climbed in my mind
and taken me down to where the heat
blisters the skin on my feet
makes me reach out and weep
for the days when I was pure of heart
and slept in peace"

or is he railing against the universe's cruel indifference to his emotional burden that seems too much to bear?

"well I've been crushing the symptoms
but I can't forget the cause
could God really be so cruel?
to give us feelings that can never be fulfilled"

I saw these guys in concert when they toured for this album and it was an amazing experience. The vocals required two microphones to achieve the distortion that they had on the album and he completely nailed every song making them better in the way that only a live performance can improve a song.
...and watching Johnny Mars play guitar is a transcendental experience in itself.

Matt Johnson has the quintessential voice for this album...this is one of those perfect albums that you couldn't imagine a world where it could get any better than how he recorded each and every song. It also has the distinction of being the only album to have a song [Sodium Light Baby] with a wah-wah pedal that I actually liked.
High praise indeed.


wacky little side note:for some reason the emotional desperation of "The Dusk" reminds me of the 'Hellblazer' graphic novels that feature John Constantine...

Song List:
(my favorites are in italics)

1. True Happiness This Way Lies
2. Love Is Stronger Than Death
3. Dogs Of Lust
4. This Is The Night
5. Slow Emotion Replay
6. Helpline Operator
7. Sodium Light Baby
8. Lung Shadows
9. Bluer Than Midnight
10. Lonely Planet

BOOK: Jitterbug Perfume

Jitterbug Perfume
Tom Robbins

As usual I am astounded by Robbins daring with the written word. His plots are wildly thoughtful and usually make you wonder how he hasn't thought up an anti gravity machine before now. Definitely not for everyone, but I am heartily amused by his whacked out sense of style and humor.

"Amazon Review: Jitterbug Perfume is an epic. which is to say, it begins in the forests of ancient Bohemia and doesn't conclude until nine o'clock tonight [Paris time]. It is a saga, as well. A saga must have a hero, and the hero of this one is a janitor with a missing bottle. The bottle is blue, very, very old, and embossed with the image of a goat-horned god. If the liquid in the bottle is actually is the secret essence of the universe, as some folks seem to think, it had better be discovered soon becaused it is leaking and there is only a drop of two left."

BOOK: Malaria Dreams

Malaria Dreams
Stuart Stevens

Kind of amusing, in fact very nicely done, however I think anything I read about the bullshit that goes on in Africa anymore just gets me so agitated that I can't get past it to enjoy the observations. Tim Cahill made an astute observation in Road Fever while he was in South America about colonized countries. Basically, to make *any* sort of profit on all the natural resources and labor they are being soaked for by the colonial gov't, they have to either steal some of it or demand a bribe to have any sort of livable income. In fact, Stuart Stevens (and other books that I can't recall of the top of my head) have noted that the customs officers or checkpoint soldiers are only given a uniform and a gun. No salary. They have to figure out a way to get money to feed themselves and their families. Teachers are basically paying to teach rather than being paid to teach. Its a really big mess... and it cheese me off to think about it. And THEN I see stuff like African leaders griping about how the 1st world nations ignore them... granted, it was primarily a European thing to begin with, but at some point they have to take some responsibility for all the corruption, mismanagement and complete denial of reality (like AIDS..hullo? its a problem there, ignoring doesn't make it go away.) that is happening in 90% of their countries.
Don't even get me started on what happens to donations from X-ian and Red Cross type organizations... I guess have to write about that sometime myself.

BOOK: Anonymous Rex

Anonymous Rex
Erik Garcia
as recommended by Mom


Very cute book I've heard described as "Men in Black, but dinosaurs." Its so very 40's detective novel and you can hear Garcia trying to talk like Bogart in your head as you read this. I'm glad he's writing another book, but I'm certain someone will try to make this into a movie as well. So I spent quite a bit of time trying to picture who I'd want to play the main character, Vincent Rubio...
Check it out.
NOTE: I recently baught this from Audible as well and I still love it. So, rest assured, the audio version is well worth the money.

"From Library Journal: Meet Vincent Rubio, the latest thing in hard-boiled private detectives. He's a dinosaur--it seems they're still among us, disguising themselves as humans. As a private eye, Rubio finds plenty of problems to solve, among them an arson case, the death of his partner, and the need to keep his true identity concealed. This book is as slug-nutty as they come--dinosaurs are known by the scents they exude and have trouble keeping their tails tucked in--but it does follow the time-honored formula for crime-and-detection fiction: intricacy of plot, mystification, unexpectedness, and progress toward a solution. Readers who are willing to meet young newcomer Garcia on his own absurdist terms, who have an appreciation for nonsense, and who do not object to anthropomorphic romps should find this a provocative tease, but it will probably jar the sensibilities of hard-core detective fiction buffs who take their mysteries seriously. Try it if your readers like laughs with their crime. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 6/15/99.]
--A.J. Anderson, GSLIS, Simmons Coll., Boston Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information."

BOOK: Skin Tight

Skin Tight
Carl Hiassen

Oh how I adore Carl Hiaasen. He's wonderfully twisted after living in South Florida for so long covering the local political scene. That means that he's seen every sort of sick and disgusting behavior that a human can exhibit. He's taken this experience and (hopefully) fictionalized the whole scenario. Wonderful. Go buy this immediately then read it twice in rapid succession.

"From the Publisher: "Good, mean fun...A twisting, high-speed ride on a roller coaster without brakes."
-- SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE Somebody wants Mick Stranahan dead, and the list of possible players is long: the plastic surgeon with the extremely shaky hands, the sleazy lawyer who advertises, the TV host whose taste for sensationalism is exceeded only by his vanity, and the hit man whose skin problems could fill a comprehensive (if bizarre) medical textbook. The whole thing is downright harrowing. It's Hiaasen at his best. And his best is very, very good. A Selection of the Literary Guild, the Doubleday Book Club and the Mystery Guild"

BOOK: The Eight

The Eight
Katherine Neville

I read really fast and I found that I couldn't read fast enough to get to the next page...it was sooo good! I can't recommend this book highly enough.

"From Library Journal: The Montglane Service, an ornate, jeweled chess set given to Charlemagne by the Moors, is said to hold a code which when deciphered will bring great power. Nations and individuals have schemed to possess all the pieces. As the set is dispersed during the French Revolution, a young novice risks her life to safeguard it. Alternating with her story are the present-day efforts of a U.S. computer expert and a Russian chess master to assemble the set and solve its mystery. Studying the code involves musical notation, chess strategy, Fibonacci numbers, and mysticism. This intriguing and complex first novel, while offering historical insights and interesting introductory quotations, calls occasionally for the suspension of credulity. The interweaving of fact and fiction is skillfully done. Highly recommended. BOMC selection.
-- Ellen Kaye Stoppel, Drake Univ. Law Lib., Des Moines"

BOOK: A Calculated Risk

A Calculated Risk
Katherine Neville

Not as strong as The Eight, but still rather interesting. She got a little predictable in the romance department, and for those who like the looks of Daniel Day Lewis, her male romantic leads are basically him... not that I mind, but get used to it. Its definitely worth the read, but don't expect what The Eight delivered.

"From Library Journal: Neville's popular first novel, The Eight ( LJ 3/1/89), featured dual story lines, one historical and one contemporary. Neville uses the same contrivance in these interspersed stories about schemes to amass great wealth: a clever tale about the early Rothschild banking dynasty and a much longer present-day story about bank executive Verity Banks's efforts to steal funds from her own institution in order to make a point about flawed computer security. The stakes are raised sky high, however, when Verity's charismatic mentor from years past shows up and challenges her to a bet that involves stealing and investing a billion dollars. Romance and riches ensue for these fetching characters in a farfetched plot. Good escapist fare.
-- Will Hepfer, SUNY at Buffalo Libs."

BOOK: Boyfriend School

Boyfriend School
Sarah Bird
(5/5)

One of my favorite books of all time, however I only can find it in used bookstores (and usually ones in Texas for that matter), but it is well worth the searching. I have lost count about how many times I have read this book and it goes with me on all my trips. [NOTE: Good news, its in reprints!!!]

This was made into a disasterous movie ("Don't Tell Her its Me" (later renamed back to "The Boyfriend School" though I would have preferred to have distanced the book from the movie as much as possible.) casting wasn't bad, but it fell into the predictable set of gas and lowbrow humor that the book avoided. )

"From Library Journal: Bird's first novel, Alamo House (LJ 9/1/86), was a hilarious female version of Animal House . Now she's once again written a hilarious novel, but this time it's a warm send-up of sorts of romance writers. Gretchen Griner, a dedicated journalist and photographer working for a semiunderground newspaper, is forced to cover the ``luvboree,'' a romance writers' convention. Expecting the worst, Gretchen instead finds her subjects interesting and intellectual, if a little eccentric. Two of them, Juanita and Lizzie, become her friends and attempt to turn Gretchen into a real-life romantic heroine by finding her a boyfriend . Bird is emerging as a writer to watch, and though her wit is piercing and cuts right to the core, it is always tempered by warmth and good intentions. Highly recommended. Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club selections.
-- Rosellen Brewer, Monterey Cty. Lib., Seaside, Cal."

Her other books:Alamo House | Mommy Club | Virgin of the Rodeo | Yokota Officers's Club

BOOK: The Vampire Armand

The Vampire Armand
Anne Rice

In a long line of vampire books, some good-some really lame, Rice is going back through the characters introduced in other books and telling their histories. This particular Vampire shows up in Lestat, and probably a couple of other books (but quite frankly its been a while since I've read the other books that I have forgotten any other stories in which he has appeared.)

Armand's tale starts with his kidnapping and subsequent rescue by Marius and continues on to tell his point of view of many of the occurrences that take place in The Vampire Lestat and Tale of the Body Thief. Its kind of nice that she decide to write these stories, since they definitely turn characters that were previously not on my happy list into sympathetic, even likable characters within her universe.

I have to admit I like her writing style. Let me qualify that:I have to admit I like Anne Rice's writing style most of the time. She really gets into the seriously gastronomically and sexually oriented descriptions for everyday things. Makes you look at even banal things like wallpaper in a different light.

If you had to read only a few of the Vampire Chronicles, read this one. Its well worth the read.

BOOK: In An Antique Land

In An Antique Land
Amitav Ghosh

I like this book, partially because it is interesting to read, the author includes a lot of translations and etymology (I was a linguistics major in school... weird things interest me) and partially because the person who had the book before me wrote in the margins (small, neat letters in legible script... he may live.) more etymologies and translations as well.
The funny thing about it is that he (the previous reader) comes across as a very educated person leaving behind pithy and educated remarks... except for one remark. I don't remember the exact situation, in fact it didn't make much of an impression on me, however the comment in the margin was: —whoa.

Heh.

I can just hear Bill and Ted reading this book in my head now.