The Difference Engine by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling

From our two lords of cyberpunk, we are brought something collectively made and different. The Difference Engine is considered an essential in the forming of Steampunk as a subgenre. It was written collectively through the mail, as the two writers Mailed floppy disks to each other from Texas to British Columbia. It sounds crazy, doesn't it? 

Instead of a regular novel, we got a collection of stories centering on a theme of analog computers, and the Babbage Machine. Instead of getting high tech low lifes in an imagined future, we get those types of characters in a less-imagined victorian setting. While it's not my favorite thing from either writer, I consider the book as successful experiment in form and genre. 

Extra Lives: Why Video Games Matter by Tom Bissell

I probably talk about privilege too much in these book reports. Oh well. Some segments of This book give the term a whole new meaning, expounding on the experience of its writer who dedicated months of his life to doing cocaine while playing Grand Theft Auto, and doing nothing else. So it is a very singular experience we get to peak into. Moreso, this book is about the impact games can have on your life and on our culture as a whole. It's worth reading for anyone who is a serious gamer and wonders if they are letting life pass them by. 

The Courage to be Disliked by Ichiro Kishimi

This book is about forming and maintaining relationships with lateral instead of vertical power structures. It is told in a series of dialogues, like something from Socrates. Was it useful to me? I don't know. It's possible. I'm generally not afraid of being disliked because very few people have the power to make my life better or worse, as it things are. But I was looking for some information to aid me in feeling better about myself, and less anxious in general. What I got was a lot about Adlerian philosophy, suggesting most things that hold us back in life come from our own doing. I'm skeptical, but I'm sure this can't apply to all people. Maybe you should read this book and let me know what you think, and if it does much to enhance your life. 

Grave Peril by Jim Butcher

Here's another in the Harry Dresden series. The third to be precise. Last time we had werewolves and this time we have Ghosts, Angels, and Demons. The demons were already there, but this time our story with them goes a bit deeper as Harry's Peril becomes more Grave, but that's part of the slow burning big story that I'll kind of forget about between now and the time I'll read the fourth book in the series. The Dresden Files are pretty good but I'm not over the hill for them, and I'll continue the series when I run out of more interesting things to fulfill my inclusion in the literate zeitgeist.

Tomorrow, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

This book is about a young team of dreamers and game designers who hit it big. It's about the romance of working obsessively with your best friends on a project of passion and ambition of heights never before dreamt. It's about the depth of friendship that can form from such an experience, and the struggles their relationships face as they become very successful and life happens. If you have any feelings at all, you'll probably like this book. It'll really get you. 

Damnation Alley by Roger Zelazny

Here's a one-off from our lord of pulpy scifi and fantasy. Damnation Alley is the nickname for the middle majority of the United States after all the nuclear bombs were dropped. The roughest toughest outlaw in the west must drive across country in a monster car, then a motorcycle to deliver an antidote to a plagued city in New England. There are monsters, storms, gangs, death, and guns. There was a B-movie made on the premise, but I'd skip it. Read the book if this sounds like your thing. 

Outcast (feat. Nicolas Cage)

Outcast is a film about knights who kill women and children. Some do it for Christ. Some only threaten to do it out of pride. I like when movies conjure the spirit of Master Splinter, with a long whiskered man using 'my son' in every sentence. More films should have that for sure. It really makes me want to talk to my dad again, so I can constantly refer to him as 'my father'. My Son assassinates My Father in China, for the throne which is rightfully his, and the weak, peaceful son runs off to avoid execution and become a great warrior.

Meanwhile the action prince (Christenson) and the action King (Cage) get tired of killing women and children. When their great Crusades are over is where we get into the meat of this film. Our heroes had talked about going east, where they might do some use their swords for good. As fate would have it, our crusaders show up at the right place at the right time to restore justice to China and become the heroes they always wanted to be. Or do they? My son, you will have to watch the film to find out.

For some reason, this film got a score of 0 on rotten tomatoes, which I don't entirely understand. These raters obviously haven't seen the Crudes. I very much enjoyed watching beautiful, grown-up Hayden Christenson with a British accent and beautiful princess Lian (played by Liu Yifei). There could have been more Cage, but I know he's a busy man with better movies to focus on. To some extent, he is the true hero of our story. Sure, the Chinese might have saved themselves without Nicolas Cage but that is not the world we live in. If this film were made today, I don't think they'd name his character Gallain. It sounds too much like Ghislaine.

Is this film totally predictable? Yes, but only as whole. There are some fun, grunty action scenes. Does it put a new angle on historical events? No, but it does romanticize a foreign time and place we'd otherwise be left to imagine. Does it say anything new about our current world? He is the lesson of the film: If you neglect your values, you can have a profoundly negative effect on the spirits of your friends. And if you're lucky, you can make things right. Not horrible. Maybe it's just a rehashing of the trauma one experiences from life in battle. Maybe there is only one god, but he/she wears many faces. I could be wrong on all accounts. Maybe Hayden Christenson always had a british accent and I never noticed.

best quote: But the Guards... Cut. Out. Her. Tongue!

1. Raising Arizona
2. The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent
3. Leaving Las Vegas
4. Red Rock West
5. Adaptation
6. Pig
7. Birdy
8. Wild at Heart
9. Renfield
10. Joe
11. National Treasure
12. Guarding Tess
13. Snake Eyes
14. Mandy
15. Dog Eat Dog
16. Color Out of Space
17. Mom and Dad
18. World Trade Center
19. Peggy Sue Got Married
20. The Rock
21. Zandalee
22. Prisoners of the Ghostland
23. City of Angels
24. Willy's Wonderland
25. Jiu Jitsu
26. Captain Corelli's Mandolin
27. Bangkok Dangerous
28. Drive Angry
29. Army of One
30. Lord of War
31. Gone in 60 Seconds
32. Matchstick Men
33. Vampire's Kiss
34. Con Air
35. Face/Off

36. Outcast

37. Trapped in Paradise
38. The Boy in Blue
39. Honeymoon in Vegas
40. Deadfall
41. Amos and Andrew
42. Moonstruck
43. Tokarev
44. The Sorcerer's Apprentice
45. Knowing
46. Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans
47. Bringing Out the Dead
48. The Family Man
49. Stolen
50. Season of the Witch
51. It Could Happen to You
52. The Wicker Man
53. Inconceivable
54. 8mm
55. The Frozen Ground
56. Left Behind
57. A Score to Settle
58. Pay the Ghost
59. Primal
60. Dying of the Light
61. Grand Isle
62. Looking Glass
63. Arsenal
64. Between Worlds
65. Ghost Rider
66. Trespass
67. The Humanity Bureau
68. Next
69. The Weather Man
70. 211
71. Fire Birds
72. The Croods

Novelist as a Vocation by Haruki Murakami

Here is yet another book about how one very talented person becomes a Novelist and maintains that status. If you haven't gathered, I have ambitions as a writer. Sure. I've written a few novels which I won't let anyone read? Why, because I don't have the confidence to do much with it. Why? Because I get distracted and want to do other creative stuff. But writing is fun, and I always want to do more of it while I'm more practiced at completing big projects in Music that very few people listen to. It wouldn't be much different to put out a long piece of fiction that even fewer people will Read. 

Whatever. Writing is fun. Haruki Murakami had fun as a writer, and he did some really great work, with a very unique method of first writing his novels in English and then translating to Japanese (his native tongue), to keep his prose simple and clear. And he does have a wonderful narrative voice.