pornokitsch

Harryhausen x War of the Worlds

Well, that's pretty awesome.

Graphic Novel Round-Up: Heroes Gone Wild

The idea of heroes gone wrong is a popular one - there's nothing more compelling than a fallen star. Historically (in a comic book sense), the caped ones were teflon-coated. Heroes were heroes, and that always shined through.

But what if they weren't?

Watchmen (1986) is, of course, the king of this genre. The entire theme of the book is (superish)heroes gone wrong - unchecked power and ego leading them to sins small & large. Still, Watchmen isn't the only great example of this genre. 

Here are five more... Agree? Disagree? Read our reviews, have a vote, and abuse us in the comments. 

Underground Reading: The California Voodoo Game by Larry Niven and Steven Barnes

 On a personal note on the progression of time, I remember picking up my copy of The California Voodoo Game from the second-hand section of Rainy Day Books (Fairway, Kansas) and reading it while my mom was at work. I was, at most, 13. 

This was the first book I ever read in the Dream Park series - and it lead to some pretty wild speculation about my own future career. Somehow I parlayed my skills at math (awesome) and tennis (not so hot) to become a fearsome warrior the likes of which the world had never seen... 

Two decades later, I suck at math, Rainy Day Books is on Twitter and The California Voodoo Game is as wildly entertaining as ever.

Graphic Novel Round-up: Shag, Marry, Push off a Cliff

Garth Ennis, Ben Templesmith and Warren Fucking Ellis - a Round-up with three of the best.

Groom Lake, Punisher: War Zone and Doktor Sleepless all after the jump.

Best of 2009: The Books

With the kvetching and the series picks out of the way, there were some great genre novels in 2009, including a few that will really stand the test of time.

Finalists:

Best Served Cold - Joe Abercrombie

Abercrombie's fourth book is where he demonstrated (ably) that he's far more than a one-hit wonder. A change of protagonist and location from his First Law trilogy, Best Served Cold deftly combines spaghetti western with low fantasy.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies - Jane Austen & Seth Grahame-Smith

Already spawning imitations, Grahame-Smith's simple, goofy idea had me giggling from start to finish. A painfully familiar book... plus zombies. What could go wrong?

The Magicians - Lev Grossman

I've cheated this book by not giving it a full review already, but Grossman's well-orchestrated mixture of The Secret History and Narnia is a fascinating read. This year's Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, The Magicians is carefully-crafted and excellently well-written. It is an unusual, mature look at magic and its practitioners. Oddly, I think it would be ruined by sequels, but as a stand-alone character study, it stands out as one of the year's finest books.

The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet - Reif Larsen

I've given Larsen's debut novel about six thumbs up already, but this is a seriously captivating coming of age story that skillfully draws on science fiction and fantasy elements.

Pornokitsch's Top Pick:

The City & The City - China Mieville

A perfect combination of character development and world building, all wrapped up in intelligent writing and a memorable, dolorous, emotive tone. The City & The City is a peerless thriller that reminds me of the crazy, explorative early days of paperback science fiction. Appropriate to the plot, Mieville is unafraid of boundaries, and it shows. The City & The City defies categorization but was easily my pick for the year's best new book.

Best of 2009: New Series

Nothing fills me with joy like falling in love with the first book of a new series. It means that there's more great reading to come for years (barring accident, injury or the Curse of Infinite Recursion that seems to strike genre authors...)

Try as I might, I didn't get to read everything that came out this year, but, of what I did get through, here are my top picks...

Best of 2009: The Year that Wasn't

Just going off the statistics, my collection contains a third fewer books printed in 2009 than in either 2008 or 2007. There wasn't less fiction published - nor did I read any less - but my urge to collect and preserve was much lower this year.

What happened? 

Speculating shamelessly, I think there are a few factors involved:

US Soccer x Evil Robot Ninjas

In honor of the World Cup draw, one of my favorite ads of all time. 

Take THAT, English Robo-Soccer Ninjas!

New Releases: The Kindle

I spent the weekend field-testing my new Kindle - a lovely, if controversial, beast.

Overall, I was shocked by how quickly I forgot that I wasn't reading a book. The screen is perfect - no eye-strain, no problems. The one potentially-annoying hardware flaw is the 'flash' of the screen as each page changes - but I stopped noticing that surprisingly quickly.

I've broken down my thoughts in a traditionally geeky fashion: hardware vs software. And in both areas, the Kindle excels. However, I did have some major problems...

The Productions of Time by John Brunner

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that John Brunner wasn't so pleased with this book...