Darwin Slept Here: Discovery, Adventure, and Swimming Iguanas in Charles Darwin's South America

by Eric Simons

(Woodstock: The Overlook Press, 2009)

Hardcover, 258 Pages, Nonfiction

ISBN: 9781590202203, US$24.00

ABCD Rating: CHECK OUT

“There’s a danger in labeling someone a genius; it makes them inaccessible. Darwin the Genius is beyond the reach of sympathy. But Darwin the person—the one who stood and watched the sunset over this same river, the one who would happily join in with Josh and I in skipping rocks—well, he was a lot like us. He was us. His career-crowning idea of evolution by natural selection is a triumph of human achievement that sprang from the perfectly achievable endeavors of careful observation, meticulous note-taking, and joyous, boundless curiosity” (224).

From the Cover: One snowy day in Ushuaia, Argentina, the self-proclaimed “southernmost city in the world,” writer Eric Simons picked up a copy of Charles Darwin’s The Voyage of the Beagle. Simons had just hiked the mountains overlooking Beagle Channel, and he found himself engrossed in Darwin’s account. Like Simons, Darwin was in his mid-twenties when he traveled to the continent. Simons followed Darwin further into South America—to stand where Darwin had stood and to explore the histories, legends and people that had fascinated him two centuries before. Simons trekked to as many of the locations Darwin wrote about as he could find to see if he could see these places through Darwin’s eyes, and to learn what South Americans know about Darwin. 2009 is a double-anniversary year for Darwin: the 200th anniversary of his birth in February, and the 150th anniversary of publication of The Origin of Species. Darwin Slept Here is an innovative and thrilling new look at a familiar subject from a compelling new writer to watch.

My Review: A week or two ago I was helping my brother move furniture in anticipation of their coming baby. While we were taking a break he threw a book in my lap and said “This book made me feel like a loser.” I raised an eyebrow and my brother continued: “I went to high school with Ricky. We were in journalism together. He’s got a published book on Darwin. I’m in school for the second time.” (We’ll leave off the fact that it made me feel like even more of a loser, since I have finally gotten my Bachelor’s degree after fourteen years of higher education.) I asked my brother if I could borrow it, since I was near finishing the book I was reading at the time, and as soon as my plate was cleared, I dug into Darwin Slept Here.

Now, after having finished this book, I come away from it with mixed feelings: I have a new respect and admiration for Darwin the man (not that I ever didn’t respect him, but he was always a “distant” historical and literary figure) but I’m not sure what to think of the author. It’s hard to separate the two of these ideas, since for Simons Darwin is—for whatever reason—inextricably linked in his (Simon’s) mind with himself, but I will do my best to separate the “idea” of the book and the “execution” of the book.

After my brother tossed the book into my lap, I flipped open to the introduction (enticingly titled “Introduction: The World’s Most Famous Iguana Hurler”) and read the following:

Evolution had done the thing right. The marine iguana of the Galapagos Islands swam well. Dined well. Lounged well. It basked in the sun, it munched seaweed, it strutted out for an occasional constitution-improving swim, all until one cloudless, sweltering September afternoon in 1835, when a young man stepped ashore and ruined everything.

Charles Darwin had not yet conceived of the theory of evolution by natural selection. Five months shy of his twenty-seventh birthday, tall and thin and already distinctively heavy-browed, he had not yet acquired a reputation as a scientist, had not yet published a celebrated travelogue about South America (or an influential treatise on tropical corals), and had not yet had a species of ostrich named after him. His visit to the Galapagos came at the tail end of a five-year trip around the world, and it did not act on him as one of those Sistine-Chapel-ceiling, hand-meets-hand kind of moments. But Darwin was in the midst of a travel-induced transformation, combining his childhood love of exploration and biology with an increasingly sophisticated ability to catalogue nature. When he published The Origin of Species twenty-four years later, it was notable for the meticulous observational detail Darwin used to support his theory. For someone who delighted in scientific inquiry, the reptilian megafauna swarming the Galapagos was a scaly, ugly, crawling—and terrific—learning opportunity.

Darwin spent one day studying tortoises, chasing them, riding them, and upending them to see if they could right themselves. He spent another day with the marine iguanas, and it was not a good day to be a member of the lizard kingdom. He cut up the iguanas to see what they were eating (seaweed), and in his journal, he disparaged their color (“dirty black”), their disposition (“stupid and sluggish”), and their looks (“hideous”). He and a co-conspirator tied one animal to a rock and dropped it off their boat, the Beagle, to see what would happen (“when, an hour afterwards, he drew up the line it was quite active”). He also noticed that some of the iguanas seemed to like the water, and he wondered: How well did they swim?

On the morning that Darwin chose to answer this question, it became evident that in one way, at least, evolution had failed the iguana: It had given it no recourse at all for dealing with thrill-seeking British naturalists. Darwin strode across the craggy rocks toward a napping “imp of darkness,” cornered it, snatched it by the tail, and hurled it into a pool left by the receding tide. The iguana, no doubt wondering what had gone wrong on a day that had started so pleasantly, swam straight back to its sunning rock.

Charles Darwin was a scientist at heart, and a good scientist always repeats his experiment. As the aggrieved beast climbed dripping from the pool, Darwin jumped forward again, clasped the iguana firmly in hand, and drew back. And then, in the name of science, discovery, and swimming iguanas, he hurled it into the sea. (11-13)

You can probably see why I was intrigued. The rest of the book plays out in much the same vein: with Darwin iguana hurling, discovering of a new species of ostrich through eating the poor creature, señorita-watching in Buenos Aires, travelling gaucho-style in the Argentinean pampas, experiencing the Concepción Earthquake of 1835, touring the gold mines of Chile and, in one of the more surreal moments, Simons attends a performance of what can only be described as a Monty Python-esque musical (appropriately titled “The Adventure of the Beagle”—El espectáculo del fin del mundo) in Tierra del Fuego which chronicles the Beagle’s expedition, as well the return of three native Fuegians (oddly named by the English who had traded for them, and this is true, York Minister, James Button and Fuegia Basket (there was a fourth who died shortly after arrival in England who had been saddled with the name Boat Memory)) to their home.

Aside from the iguana hurling, I found the story of Simons’ time in Tierra del Fuego and his attendance at El espectáculo del fin del mundo to be the most amusing portion of his travelogue. The musical, as Simons describes it, is nothing short of ridiculous (in a good sense) and, as I mentioned above, sounds like a Monty Python version of events. For example, here are some of the lyrics to the songs, as Simons provides. The sailors on the Beagle sing by way of prologue: “We’ll fight the roaring seas / We shall face no defeat / All across the Seven Seas / The Beagle will succeed” and later on, Darwin sings “There’s no way to go on / And there’s no turning back / Nowhere to run / Nowhere to hide / I’m torn inside” (136-137). Oh, and did I mention that Simons reports that there is “a twenty-foot-tall dancing sloth fossil that sang to Darwin that ‘you can try to deny what your eyes meet … but think you fool, don’t be a mule … I am as real as these bones’” (137)? Well, there is. (Also, according to Simons there is a strange homoerotic overtone between the actor playing the Beagle’s captain and one of the native Fuegians, which—to both Simons and me—seems an oddly placed interpretation.) It would almost be worth travelling to Tierra del Fuego just to see El espectáculo del fin del mundo!

Simons’ enthusiasm for his subject cannot be denied. He drags often reluctant friends across the South American continent in search of historical sites that Darwin visited during his time on the Beagle, accosting locals, travel bureaus, museum proprietors and once strolling right up to the gates of the largest gold mine in Chile and asking—unannounced and without any sort of introduction or recommendation—if he and his friend can look around, since that is what Darwin did: visited mines in Chile. He badgers locals about Darwin, most of whom could care less about the naturalist and often didn’t even know that Darwin had even visited their sleepy little corner of the world in the Nineteenth-Century. It is here that I found the distinction between Simons’ “idea” or “subject” and Simons’ “execution” to wear a little thin.

Simons repeatedly comes across as taking the stance that Darwin is immutable, infallible and utterly correct and that anyone who does not believe in Darwin’s Theory of Evolution (especially those who believe in the Biblical account of Creation) are backwards bumpkins who are living in the Dark Ages (not his words, but certainly his sentiment). As someone who does believe in a Creator, but also believes that evolution, natural selection and a Creator are not mutually exclusive ideas Simons stance comes off as condescending at best and antagonistic and belligerent at worst. Simons states that he has no use for evangelism at all and when he does meet up with missionaries at one point (on a penguin viewing boat tour in Port Desire, Argentina) he spends his time avoiding them, rather than engaging with them about Darwin and his interests (I know that this probably would have worked since the missionaries in question were from my own Church and are—for the most part—open to discussion as we believe, as I stated above that evolution, natural selection and a Creator are not mutually exclusive ideas.)

All too often, however, Simons’ fanatic devotion to Darwin plays out in a way that seems quasi-religious in its own, rather ironic, way, and this gets in the way of Simons’ ultimate point that The Origin of Species overshadows The Voyage of the Beagle; that Darwin is too often seen as the white-bearded evolutionist that his later work in life presented him as, and we almost always overlook the fact that Darwin’s voyage on the Beagle was that of an enthusiastic and curious twenty-something who liked to throw iguanas into the sea, ride with gauchos and crawl over every mountain and hill he could get his hands on (as well as ogle the señoritas in Buenos Aires). Darwin was a man of science, yes, but he was also a human being who loved life, was curious about the world around him and had an insatiable desire to learn.

This is the Darwin that we all need to get to know and love, and in spite of the shortcomings and/or biases of Simons as an author, the book, overall, manages to present a wonderful picture the formative experiences of a young man cut loose in South America to learn and explore and who goes on to change the face of science as we know it, as well as the devotion and obsession of another young man, nearly a century-and-a-half later who goes in search of his idol across the vast backdrop of South America. It is a good read, maybe even a great read, and one I would recommend—with some reservations, as mentioned above—and a great book to read in this year that is the bicentennial celebration of Darwin’s birth as well as sesquicentennial celebration of the publication of The Origin of Species. (The website for Darwin Slept Here can be found HERE.)

My Favorite Horror Story

edited by Mike Baker and Martin H. Greenberg

(New York: DAW Books, Inc., 2000)

Paperback, 303 Pages, Short Fiction Anthology

ISBN: 9780886779146, US$6.99

ABCD Rating: BACKLIST

From the Cover: What do today’s top horror writers read—and why? This was the question posed to some of the most influential authors in the field today. This book is their answer. Here are fifteen of the most memorable stories in the genre, each one personally selected by a well-known writer, and each prefaced by that writer’s explanation of his or her choice. Here’s your chance to enjoy familiar favorites, and perhaps to discover some wonderful treasures. In each case, you’ll have the opportunity to see the story from the perspective of a master of the field.

This collection contains the following stories: “Sweets to the Sweet” by Robert Bloch chosen by Stephen King, “The Father-Thing” by Philip K. Dick chosen by Ed Gorman, “The Distributor” by Richard Matheson chosen by F. Paul Wilson, “A Warning to the Curious” by M.R. James chosen by Ramsey Campbell, “Opening the Door” by Arthur Machen chosen by Peter Atkins, “The Colour Out of Space” by H.P. Lovecraft chosen by Richard Laymon, “The Inner Room” by Robert Aickman chosen by Peter Straub, “Young Goodman Brown” by Nathaniel Hawthorne chosen by Rick Hautala, “The Rats in the Walls” by H.P. Lovecraft chosen by Michael Slade, “The Dog Park” by Dennis Etchison chosen by Richard Christian Matheson, “The Animal Fair” by Robert Bloch chosen by Joe R. Lansdale, “The Pattern” by Ramsey Campbell chosen by Poppy Z. Brite, “The Tell-Tale Heart” by Edgar Allan Poe chosen by Joyce Carol Oates, “An Occurrence of Owl Creek Bridge” by Ambrose Bierce chosen by Dennis Etchison, “The Human Chair” by Edigawa Rampo chose by Harlan Ellison.

My Review: Now, this one (unlike the Alfred Hitchcock book I reviewed the other day) I know I was turned on to by my friend at reading by pub light. Of course as soon as I read his review, I had to run out and get myself a copy of this book because I can’t resist a good collection of classic horror stories, and there are some real gems between the covers of this paperback.

“Sweets to the Sweet” is a disturbing little tale by one of the best: Robert Bloch. Honestly, I have yet to read a story by Bloch that I have hated, and this particular story is actually quite unsettling by the time you get to the end. Bloch does a good job of making you certain of the outcome at the beginning, and then making you question that certainty. Seriously, Bloch is one of the best, and “Sweets to the Sweet” is one of his best.

“The Father-Thing” was a story that honestly chilled me. Most of the writing of Philip K. Dick that I am familiar with of the science fiction variety—Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, The Minority Report, A Scanner Darkly, etc.—I had no idea he wrote horror (however stretched that definition may be in respect to this story). What I loved best about this story was its sense of sweaty paranoia and utter terror that Dick manages to create … it is quite reminiscent of Jack Finney’s The Body Snatchers (which is a book I might have to dig out of storage now).

“The Distributor” was, along with “The Human Chair,” the story that made the greatest impression on me in reading this anthology. My senior year in high school, I took a science fiction-fantasy literature class and one of the stories we read was “One Ordinary Day, With Peanuts” by Shirley Jackson (I tried to find an online version of the story to link to, but I couldn’t find one so you should go out and find a copy of it for yourself). “The Distributor” is very reminiscent of Jackson’s story only much much darker. Of course, it is a Matheson story and so one should expect dark things, but this is dark beyond dark, really … especially since there is nothing remotely supernatural about the story … it is all about the darkness of the human heart and how people will usually think the worst of each other. It reminded me also of the classic Twilight Zone episode “The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street” (another one of those formidable experiences (along with Harlan Ellison’s “A Boy and His Dog,” Jackson’s “One Ordinary Day, With Peanuts”) that shaped my love of horror literature and the type of fiction I read and write. If for no other reason (and believe me, there are plenty of reasons to pick up My Favorite Horror Story) you need to pick it up to experience Matheson’s “The Distributor.”

“A Warning to the Curious” was one of those stories that I enjoyed, and it unsettled me, but I had to go back and reread the ending to figure out what had happened. This is my second experience with M.R. James (he also wrote a story in the Alfred Hitchcock book) and I guess you could say that the jury is still out on what I think about James. They are very fascinating stories, and “Warning” is especially chilling … but I don’t know, I guess I’ll have to read more of his stuff before I can say, conclusively, whether or not I like him.

“Opening the Door.” Then we come to “Opening the Door” which is one of the longer entries in the collection and even though Peter Atkins (who chose the story) warns that Machen can get a little long-winded, overly philosophical and too pedantic it will not properly prepare you for “Opening the Door.” In all honesty, I was very aware of what the plot and action of the story were, but I had no idea what the Hell was going on because Machen knows nothing of the economy of words. He spends entirely too much time saying nearly nothing at all, and when you get to the end, it is entirely too predictable. Unless you’re a complete-ist like me, or a die-hard Machen fan (are there any out there?) then you’d do well to skip over “Opening the Door.”

“The Colour Out of Space” is a classic bit of horror fiction and in spite of many of H.P. Lovecraft’s shortcomings as an author, “Colour” is a story that will chill you to the bone. Lovecraft has a wonderful sense of what to show and what to keep hidden, and the fact that until the very end, much of the horror of “Colour” remains hidden adds to the suspense and fear that Lovecraft creates in the story. If you have never read any Lovecraft, “Colour” is a good place to start.

It is no wonder to me that Peter Straub was the one who chose “The Inner Room” for this collection. There was something very “Straub-ian” about the story to me. I don’t know if I could quite put my finger on it, if you asked me, but there was something about the slow set-up and then extremely odd pay-off that made me think of the books of Straub that I have read in the past. It very clearly was an influence on Straub’s writing, as he says in his introduction. I will say, though, that I will never look at a dollhouse in quite the same way again.

“Young Goodman Brown” is one of those stories that every burgeoning horror writer needs to read and its inclusion here (along with Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart”) should be a given. “Brown” is such a formative story of horror that it seems almost foolish to try and talk about it here. I could probably write a whole thesis and dissertation on “Young Goodman Brown.” It is such a classic that if you haven’t yet read it, stop what you’re doing right now and get to your nearest collection of Nathaniel Hawthorne and read “Young Goodman Brown.” I’ll wait.

Back yet? No? Okay, I’ll wait a little longer.

Okay, ready? Another classic from H.P. Lovecraft, “The Rats in the Walls” is another one of those classic horror stories that every horror aficionado needs to read. I love this one in particular, because of the claustrophobic feeling that Lovecraft creates as well as the history that he creates, and when you get to the pay-off it is simply horrifying. Lovecraft is simply one of the best.

“The Dog Park” is a story that I wasn’t sure what was going on with. The ending is quite confusing and one that I had to go back and read again, before I think I figured out what was going on at the end. It is an odd little story, quite honestly, but one that the more I think about it, the more I like it.

“The Animal Fair” is another one of those stories by Robert Bloch that you just have to read to believe. It is terrifying, horrific and absolutely brilliant at the same time. It is another one of my favorites in the collection, and one that will stay with me for a very long time.

The same can be said of “The Pattern” which is one of those great Ramsey Campbell stories that is entirely unsettling and makes for a very disconcerting read. I enjoyed it immensely … it is sufficiently creepy and it is—as with all of Ramsey Campbell’s writing—utterly disturbing!

As for Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart” and Ambrose Bierce’s “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” I refer you to my above comments on “Young Goodman Brown.” (But just one more note on “The Tell-Tale Heart”: Since when is Joyce Carol Oates (who chose Poe’s story) a horror author? Just wonderin’.)

Back already? Okay then. Allons-y!

That brings us to “The Human Chair” which is, without a doubt, the single most disturbing read in My Favorite Horror Story. I had no idea what to expect from Edogawa Rampo’s story other than that it would be a good’un because Harlan Ellison had chosen it. This single fact is, of course, enough to get me to read anything, but in the case of “The Human Chair” it doesn’t really need anyone’s endorsement (much less mine, which counts for considerably less than Ellison’s) but this really is a story that needs to be experienced to be believed. It really was a story that made me incredibly uncomfortable and made me—pardon the pun—squirm in my chair. Edogawa Rampo is a penname for Japanese author Taro Hirai and is a transliteration of the Japanese pronunciation of Edgar Allan Poe, and truly, “The Human Chair” lives up to the standards of that granddaddy of gothic. It is a story that I could easily see as having come from the mind of Mr. Poe, it is that disturbing and simply wonderful.

All-in-all My Favorite Horror Story is a collection not to be missed. It has all of the best that the world of Horror short fiction has to offer as well as some fresh new or little-known (or both) additions that make it such a great collection to read. I really do highly recommend it. It also got me to thinking what short story was most influential on me, and as I mentioned here and in the review for 12 Stories, it comes down to one of two: “A Boy and His Dog” by Harlan Ellison or “One Ordinary Day, With Peanuts” by Shirley Jackson. If, at some future date, I was asked to pick a story for a collection such as this, I would have a hard time picking between those two. Luckily, though, I don’t have to pick, I just get to enjoy what authors such as Stephen King, Ramsey Campbell, Poppy Z. Brite and Richard Laymon picked as important to them. I suggest you do the same.

For another review of My Favorite Horror Story, check out reading by pub light.

Alfred Hitchcock Presents 12 Stories They Wouldn't Let Me Do On TV

edited by Alfred Hitchcock

(New York: Dell Books, 1957)

Paperback, 224 Pages, Short Fiction Anthology

ISBN: 9780440136453, US$1.50

ABCD Rating: BACKLIST

From the Cover: Uncensored Shock! Some books are meant for childish eyes. Others are tailored for readers with delicate sensibilities and fragile nerves. Still others can be safely scanned before going to sleep at night. This book, however, is not one of them. For when Alfred Hitchcock is the man in charge, you can be sure of a feast designed to please the strongest appetite for pure horror and unadulterated evil. Here are 12 ultimate thrillers!

This collection contains the following stories: “Being a Murderer Myself” by Arthur Williams, “Lukundoo” by Edward Lucas White, “A Woman Seldom Found” by William Samson, “The Perfectionist” by Margaret St. Clair, “The Price of the Head” by John Russell, “Love Comes to Miss Lucy” by Q. Patrick, “Sredni Vashtar” by Saki (H.H. Munro), “Love Lies Bleeding” by Phillip MacDonald, “The Dancing Partner” by Jerome K. Jerome, “Casting the Runes” by M.R. James, “The Voice in the Night” by William Hope Hodgson, and “How Love Came to Professor Guildea” by Robert S. Hichens.

My Review: I don’t remember where I first heard of this book. Honestly, I could have sworn that it was from my friend at reading by pub light, but after searching each and every one of his reviews and not finding it, I don’t know where that leaves me. I would have bet money it was reading by pub light who turned me on to this book, but oh well. Whatcha gonna do?

Anyway, the point is that I came across this book and was able to get myself a copy. When the back of the book promises “Uncensored Shock!”, I can honestly say that that is what Hitchcock delivers … in spades. These are, honestly, some of the most disturbing and unnerving short stories that I have ever come across.

“Being a Murderer Myself” is a story that, in a world of C.S.I.s and Law & Orders, could be somewhat mundane—the story of spurned love and murder as told from the murderer’s point of view. Nothing we haven’t seen in a thousand TV shows and movies in the last twenty years, right? Well, you would be if not for two things: (1) the simple fact that Williams wrote the story for Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine 51 years ago (long before C.S.I. was a glimmer in a studio exec’s eye), and (2) that Williams tells the story with so much more style, panache and glee than any C.S.I. screenwriter that it is a pleasure to read. Given these two simple facts, “Being a Murderer Myself” is nothing short of perfect, and the ending is enough to send shivers up even the hardiest of spines.

“Lukundoo” was one of my favorites in the collection for sheer horror. While is suffers from a healthy overdose of “White Man’s Burden,” the story itself is so suffused with paranoia and the unknown that it is easy to overlook that unfortunate fact and revel in the story’s ability to create a sense of utter terror and revulsion in the Reader.

“A Woman Seldom Found” is another good’un in Hitchcock’s collection, and one that is short, sweet, to the point and utterly unsettling.

“The Perfectionist” was another of my favorites from the book and is especially great because it manages to create a sense of terror and horror while keeping it wholly rooted in the real. There is no supernatural boogie man here, only good old-fashioned human-created awfulness. Hitchcock picked each of these stories as—and I am paraphrasing here—ones that would have fit his show well, but that for one reason or another, would have been impossible to recreate (either because of the scope of the story, the constraints of television making, or because of the standards and practices of the time). “The Perfectionist” fits neatly into all three of those categories. The idea boils down to what would you do to draw the perfect drawing?

“The Price of the Head” and “Love Comes to Miss Lucy” while both otherwise “good reads” are pale imitations when compared to their more macabre cousins in the anthology. Add to that the fact that “Price” suffers from an embarrassingly strong streak of racism and racial stereotyping and “Miss Lucy” has a confused ending that it took three goings-over to get what happened, and you’re best off moving to the next of Hitchcock’s offerings, especially since that offering is …

“Sredni Vashtar.” This story is, far and away, the single best entry in the collection. I was enthralled by this story, especially due to the complete sense of unease and utter shock that the story offers. I have read one or two other Saki (a.k.a. H.H. Munro) short stories (of those “Tobermory” was my previous favorite, though “The Schartz-Metterklume Method” comes in a close second) but “Sredni Vashtar” blows them out of the water. This is one of those stories that will stick with me for a very long time to come, much like Harlan Ellison’s “A Boy and His Dog” which I first read in middle school. You can read “Sredni Vashtar,” if you’d like, HERE.

“Love Lies Bleeding” was, I thought, a particularly unexciting and rather confusing tale of love and murder. Half the time I had no idea what was going on, and by the time it came to the end, it left me scratching my head and asking “Wha…?” Do yourself a favor and skip “Love Lies Bleeding” and go back and read “Sredni Vashtar” one more time. (In fact, this story made such a non-impression on my that in writing this review, I had to go back and skim through it to remind myself what is was about as the title called up no memories.)

“The Dancing Partner” was a fun little piece with a very macabre twist that I did not see coming. I won’t spoil it for you and just say read “The Dancing Partner” and then lament the fact that Hitchcock decided this one could not be translated to television, because if anyone could have done it justice, it would have been Hitchcock, though possibly Serling, had he got his hands on this little gem.

I enjoyed “Casting the Runes” though it is easy to see why Hitchcock passed on this one for his show. It is the second longest story of the collection and while it does have some nice supernatural chills, it is slow on the kind of action needed to make good television; pages and pages of people sitting around discussing arcane rituals and spells does not good television make, the ending, however is very tense and quite spectacular, all things considered.

I will come out and say that I love the fiction of William Hope Hodgson. The House on the Borderlands is one of the most stunning pieces of horror fiction that I have ever had the pleasure to read, and “The Voice in the Night” is no exception. The fear of the unknown is what Hodgson does best and the unknown is what “Voice” has by the boatload (no pun intended, though that would make more sense if you’d read the story). Anyway, there is so much unease and general spookiness in the story without actually revealing anything until the absolute end that this one has to be read to be believed. It is quite reminiscent of Stephen King’s short story “Grey Matter” (from Night Shift) and when coupled with the fact that King is an admirer of Hodgson’s, I would be very surprised if “The Voice in the Night” did not serve as one of the kernels of inspiration for King’s short story.

This brings us to “How Love Came to Professor Guildea” which is not only the longest story in the collection (clocking in at a whopping 51 pages) but is also one of the most convoluted and confusing stories in the book. While I appreciate ambiguity in a story of the supernatural, I also like something a little more definitive than what Hichens offers. There is absolutely nothing on which the Reader can hang their hat to get a handle on this story (how’s that for mixing my metaphors) and in the end, what there is in the way of revelation is a bit disappointing.

In short, what Hitchcock’s collection of 12 Stories They Wouldn’t Let Me Do On TV proves is that while there are some stories that you just cannot “do on TV” not all of those are created equal. Some are excellent, most are good, and a few just fall flat. Stick with the excellent, read the good, and then take my advice and skip those that fall flat and reread the ones that are excellent.

The ABCs of Bryan's Books

I found this at Boston Bibliophile, she calls it the ABC Book Meme, and these are the instructions she has on her blog:

“For this meme, you list a favorite book that starts with each letter of the alphabet. If you don't have a book for a letter (such as Z or X) than you can substitute a favorite book that simply has that letter in the title (i.e. The Lost City of Z or Hot Six by Janet Evanovich). However, you can only do this a maximum of 3 times. (Z, X, and Q, but not Z, X, Q, and V.) Books can be of any genre from fiction to non-fiction to poetry to textbooks.” And I am adding the rule that articles at the front of books (The, A, An) don’t count and it is the next letter that truly counts, so The Stand is an S book and A Medicine for Melancholy is an M book, etc.

A: American Gods by Neil Gaiman
B: Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War by Mark Bowden
C: The Club Dumas by Arturo Pérez-Reverte
D: Dragons of Autumn Twilight by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman
E: East of Eden by John Steinbeck
F: Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
G: The Gulf War Did Not Take Place by Jean Baudrillard
H: Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill
I: I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
J: Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton
K: The Knife Man: The Extraordinary Life and Times of John Hunter, Father of Modern Surgery by Wendy Moore
L: Lord of the Flies by William Golding
M: The Midwich Cuckoos by John Wyndham
N: Night Shift: Excursions into Horror by Stephen King
O: Off Season by Jack Ketchum
P: Psycho by Robert Bloch
Q: L.A. Requiem by Robert Crais
R: The Road by Cormac McCarthy
S: The Shining by Stephen King
T: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
U: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith
V: The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice
W: World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks
X: The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty
Y: The Yellow Wallpaper and Other Writings by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Z: The Boys from Brazil by Ira Levin

Austen Takes to the Seas in Quirk's New Monster "Mash Up"

From robaroundbooks:

Fans of the “zombie mash up” hit Pride and Prejudice and Zombies will be thrilled to hear that Quirk Books will be publishing their second “adapted classic” on September 15th, titled Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters.

Billed as a tale of ROMANCE, HEARTBREAK and TENTACLES, Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters keeps the Austen theme, but takes a leap away from battling the zombie horde, throwing Elinor and Marianne Dashwood and the rest of Sense and Sensibility “crew,” into the “deep blue,” where a whole host of marine monsters lie in wait, ready to unleash a barrage of salty combat.

In this follow-up adapted by Brooklyn writer Ben H. Winters, sea creatures as the monster theme is a direction which fans of the first novel perhaps weren’t expecting. Quirk Editorial Director Jason Rekulak explains the choice for this latest title:

A couple of publishers are crashing Jane Austen vampire novels that will no doubt capitalize on the success of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, and there were certainly plenty of people who urged me to do the same. But I think Pride and Prejudice and Zombies fans are counting on us to deliver something original, and I don’t think they will be disappointed.

I’m sure fans won’t be disappointed either, and to whet their appetite Quirk have produced an unmissable book trailer for Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, which can be viewed either on the Quirk Classics website, or on the Irreference YouTube channel.

So publication day for Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters is September 15th (both in the UK and the US), the same day that Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol enjoys its release. So it looks like giant lobsters and octopi won’t be the only thing that the Dashwood’s will be battling on that day. It’s inevitable who’s going to come out on top, but I know which one of the two is going to be the most fun and exciting to read.

Bryan back: My review of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies can be found HERE. The trailer follows.

My Hippie Grandmother

by Reeve Lindbergh

illustrated by Abby Carter

(Cambridge: Candlewick Press, 2003)

Hardcover, 20 Pages, Children’s

ISBN: 9780763606718, US$15.99

ABCD Rating: BACKLIST

I have a hippie grandmother.

I’m really glad she’s mine.

She hasn’t cut her hair at all

Since nineteen sixty-nine.

From the Cover: For the girl in this poem, nothing is better than a day with her hippie grandmother—eating wheat-an-honey bread, working in the garden, selling veggies at the farmer’s market, and picketing city hall. But the very best part of being together is the love they share. FLOWER POWER FOREVER!

My Review: This is one of those books that, when I saw it on the shelf at the library, I just knew we had to get. As I’ve stated before on this blog (and on my other blog), we are what most people would term as “crunchy.” We have made certain parenting and lifestyle decisions that put us on the liberal-hippie-crunchy end of the political and social spectrum, and so a book like My Hippie Grandmother is the perfect book for someone like us.

Lindbergh’s poem (and yes, she is one of those Lindberghs) and Carter’s illustrations are delightful and whimsical and downright fun, and as my wife and I read it to our children, my wife expressed a desire to one day be a “hippie grandmother.” I think we’re well on our way and this book is a wonderful tribute to love and grandmothers and granddaughters as well as the ideals of wanting to make the world a better place through living better, eating better, believing in something better, and making your opinions known.

How to Draw Washington's Sights and Symbols

by Aileen Weintraub

-A Kid’s Guide to Drawing America Series-

(New York: PowerKids Press, 2002)

Hardcover, 32 Pages, Children’s

ISBN: 9780823961047, US$25.00

ABCD Rating: DITCH

From the Cover: PowerKids Press’s 52-book series, A Kid’s Guide to Drawing America, has individual volumes on each of the 50 states, plus Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. Each colorful, fact-filled volume provides a comprehensive introduction to key sights and symbols of a state or territory. Cultural and natural landmarks are covered. The state and territory’s history, geography, and economy are also explored. To help bring this information to life, each book supplies easy-to-follow directions and step-by-step illustrations so readers can draw some of the wonderful things they are learning about. Each book features: illustrated list of drawing terms, state fact list, information about a painter whose work celebrates the natural beauty of the featured state of territory, red highlighting of each new step in a drawing, dynamic photographs of the state’s sights and symbols to complement the step-by-step drawings, websites for further information.

This guide includes instructions on how to draw: Map of Washington, The State Seal, The State Flag, The Pink Rhododendron, The Western Hemlock, The Willow Goldfinch, The Bald Eagle, Mount Saint Helens, The Space Needle, and Washington’s Capitol.

My Review: Before I decided to become an English major … I was an artist. I have always been able to draw, it’s just one of my innate talents. As a child and teenager, I would devour how-to-draw books from the library. I had dreams of becoming a Disney animator. Then I found a larger passion: books.

This is not to say, however, that I have given up drawing. I have always and will continue to doodle and draw for my own enjoyment and, now that I’m a father, especially for my kids. Now that my son is interested in drawing and his drawings are beginning to look like what he says they are we have been picking up how-to-draw books at the library.

We came across the Kid’s Guide to Drawing America Series at one of our local libraries, and since we lay claim to Washington as our home state, and since we will be headed to Washington so I can attend graduate school this Fall, we picked up the How to Draw Washington’s Sights and Symbols book.

Unfortunately, this is not a book that I would recommend to people who want to use it to draw the Space Needle, or Washington State or any of the other sights and symbols in this book. The method is one that I detest in how-to-draw books. For example, the directions for drawing the Map of Washington State are as follows (now, they are accompanied by drawings, but still…):

1. Start by drawing a rectangle.
2. Draw the shape of Washington using squiggles and wavy lines.
3. Erase extra lines, and draw a circle to mark Seattle. Now draw the shape of Lake Roosevelt.
4. Draw a square to mark Umatilla National Forest and a triangle for Mount Rainier National Park.
5. To finish your map, draw a star to mark Olympia, the capital of Washington. You can also make a key in the upper right corner to mark Washington’s points of interest.

“Draw the shape of Washington using squiggles and wavy lines”? These are the kinds of directions that I detest in a how-to-drawing book. This is lazy drawing direction, in my opinion and experience, and the kind of directions that will lead to frustrated children because they’re drawing doesn’t look right, and the rest of the instructions for the rest of the drawings are just as bad. “Draw the shape of [George] Washington’s head,” “Draw the shape of an eagle,” “Draw in wavy triangle-shapes lines for snow” … it’s bad how-to.

Now, in fairness to the series, each state’s book is done by a different author, so maybe California’s or Utah’s or South Carolina’s instructions are better than Weintraub’s, but I don’t know for sure. All I know is that in the case of How to Draw Washington’s Sights and Symbols, you’d be better off avoiding the book, which is unfortunate, because the idea is so wonderful.

If I may, my advice would be to find a how-to-draw book by Ed Emberley (he has about a billion of them out there). These were my personal favorites growing up, and are basic, detailed and contain easy-to-follow step-by-step instructions for drawing just about everything using only basic shapes and lines.

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs

by Judi Barrett

illustrated by Ron Barrett

(New York: Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 1978)

Hardcover, 32 Pages, Children’s

ISBN: 9780689306471, US$16.95

ABCD Rating: ACQUIRE

From the Cover: The tiny town of Chewandswallow was very much like any other tiny town except for its weather which came three times a day, at breakfast lunch and dinner. But it never rained rain and it never snowed snow and it never blew just wind. It rained things like soup and juice. It snowed things like mashed potatoes. And sometimes the wind blew in storms of hamburgers. Life for the townspeople was delicious until the weather took a turn for the worse. The food got larger and larger and so did the portions. Chewandswallow was plagued by damaging floods and storms of huge food. The town was a mess and the people feared for their lives. Something had to be done, and in a hurry.

My Review: This “Blast from the Past” came to my attention again when, a couple of weeks ago, I saw the trailer for the animated film adaptation online. After remembering Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, the next time we went to the library, I made sure to check it out so I could read it to my son and daughter.

My son loved it. My daughter … well, she’s one, so it’ll take some time for her to appreciate it. But, as I said, my son loved it. He liked the drawings and the wacky idea that hamburgers and juice and spaghetti fall from the sky. (He’s sitting next to me looking at it and laughing and calling it “silly” as I type this review. SCORE!) For my part, this is a book that is filled with nostalgia. I remember this book from my childhood, and I loved the whimsical premise, and, like my son, I thoroughly enjoyed Ron Barrett’s great illustrations. They are absolutely marvelous, and looking at them from the perspective of nearly three decades, they almost seem to have a MAD Magazine-like quality to them.

They are also quite memorable. The drawings of the giant pancake on the school, the pea soup fog, the roofless restaurant, or the lady with the stroller running from a giant donut—to name just a few—are images that have stayed with me since my childhood, and I am thrilled to be able to share it with my children.

As for the film adaptation, I am torn. Independent of the book, it looks like a lot of fun (and the fact that it stars Anna Farris, Bruce Campbell, Bill Hader and Mr. T is a big plus). However, taken together with the book, it looks like a disappointment on two levels: (1) it explains why Chewandswallow has the weather it does. That was part of the original charm of the book, that it was unexplained and just taken as fact. And (2) the makers have departed from Barrett’s illustrative style creating a more cartoony look for the film, which is just the biggest disappointment I could think of.

So, in my opinion, skip taking your kids to the film, and read them the book instead. They’ll thank you for it, I promise.

The Road

by Cormac McCarthy

(New York: Vintage Books, 2006)

Trade Paperback, 287 Pages, Fiction

ISBN: 9780307387899, US$14.95

ABCD Rating: ACQUIRE

From the Cover: A father and his son walk alone through burned America. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind. It is cold enough to crack stones, and when the snow falls it is gray. The sky is dark. Their destination is the coast, although they don’t know what, if anything, awaits them there. They have nothing; just a pistol to defend themselves against the lawless bands that stalk the road, the clothes they are wearing, a cart of scavenged food—and each other. The Road is the profoundly moving story of a journey. It boldly imagines a future in which no hope remains, but in which the father and his son, “each the other’s world entire,” are sustained by love. Awesome in the totality of its vision, it is an unflinching meditation on the worst and the best that we are capable of: ultimate destructiveness, desperate tenacity, and the tenderness that keeps two people alive in the face of total devastation.

My Review: I have had this book on my shelf for three years now and each and every month for those three years I took this book off of the shelf and said “This month, I’m going to read The Road” and each time I put it back on the shelf and said “Not yet. I’m not ready to read this.” Let me explain: this book came out shortly before my son was born, and I got it after he was born, and as a new father, I just couldn’t bring myself to read a book in which, as the back of the book says: “A father and his son walk alone through burned America.” It cut just a little too close to the bone, so to speak.

That all changed when, within the course of twenty-four hours both my brother (a recent father himself) and my father told me I needed to read it. I expressed my reservations about the subject matter of the book, and they both said that I needed to read it in spite of those concerns. So, when I finished The Ayatollah Begs to Differ I finally picked up The Road and dug right in. Forty-eight hours later I was done with the book.

I will say this … it was a very raw and emotional forty-eight hours. It was a forty-eight hours in which I hugged my son more, and in which I was depleted emotionally and physically. Cormac McCarthy’s book is, as I have said, a very raw read, and one which was both very hard to get through and which I simply could not put it down. McCarthy’s prose is extremely sparse—reminiscent of that of Ernest Hemingway in fact—and holds back no punches. His decision to eschew quotation marks and apostrophes (turning can’t and won’t, for example, into cant and wont) are decisions that I usually detest, however, in McCarthy’s hands, it only added to the overall atmosphere of total breakdown and the loss of control that the book exudes.

That feeling, of what one father does in the face of the collapse of not only society but of the natural world took so much out of me in the reading of it. No names are ever given in the book, the characters are only ever “The Man” and “The Boy,” or “Son” and “Papa” or any such permutations of those pronouns, and this invites, demands even, that the Reader, especially a father such as myself places himself and his son into the book, my and my son’s faces on McCarthy’s characters, our voices in their mouths. The emotional connection that this creates with the characters in the book is a connection that is very very visceral.

When the man says to his son “My job is to take care of you. I was appointed to do that by God. I will kill anyone who touches you. Do you understand?” (77), I found myself making the same mental promise to my son. Every success and failure that the man and the boy experienced is a success and a failure that I experienced vicariously. By the time I had, in the moment, reached the end of the book, I was so emotionally drained by the 287-page trek that I had taken through McCarthy’s post-apocalyptic landscape, I didn’t really care that the ending seemed contrived or “too easy an out,” a deus ex machina as it were.

Even looking back on the book, I can forgive McCarthy (a father himself, who was inspired to write The Road while travelling with his son) the story’s end because of the rest of the book. The devastatingly real characters, the truly hellacious situation into which the man and the boy are thrown, the completely accurate and heartbreaking depiction of a desperate father, all of these aspects of The Road not only allow me to forgive McCarthy’s ending but also embrace the ending as in a book about hope that has very little hope, the ending makes me, as a father, feel much better about myself in the role of “the man” and my son in the role of “the boy.”

I know I have used the words “raw” and “emotional” a lot in this review, but those are the best words to describe The Road which is, without a doubt, one of the best—and most difficult—books I have read to date.

For another review, check out reading by pub light.

There will be a film adaptation of McCarthy’s book released this coming October (October 16th, to be exact), directed by Joe Hillcoat, and starring Viggo Mortensen, Charlize Theron, Guy Pearce, and Robert Duvall.

The Book of Totally Irresponsible Science: 64 Daring Experiments for Young Scientists

by Sean Connolly

(New York: Workman Publishing Company, Inc., 2008)

Hardcover, 208 Pages, Nonfiction

ISBN: 9780761150206, US$12.95

ABCD Rating: ACQUIRE

STAND BACK! GENIUS AT WORK!

ENCASE your little brother in a giant soap bubble.

DROP Mentos into a bottle of diet soda, and stand back as a geyser erupts.

LAUNCH a rocket made from a film canister.

From the Cover: Here are 64 amazing experiments that snap, crackle, pop, ooze, crash, boom, and stink. Giant air cannons. Home-made lightning. Marshmallows on steroids. Matchbox microphones. There’s even an introduction to alchemy. (Not sure what that is? Think “medieval wizard.”) None of these experiments require special training, and all use stuff found in the kitchen or garden shed. You’d be irresponsible not to try them.

ATTENTION, PARENTS: Yes, your kids may need your help with a few experiments. And yes, sometimes it may get a tad messy. But it’s not pure mayhem. The balloon rocket whizzing through the garden? It demonstrates Newton’s Third Law of Motion. That chunk of potato launched across the kitchen from a tube? Welcome to Boyle’s Law. EVERY EXPERIMENT DEMONSTRATES REAL SCIENCE, at its most memorable.

My Review: The word “FUN” doesn’t begin to describe this book, but perhaps I should give a little background. I apologize in advance to those who know me in real life, as this may be repetitive. As parents, my wife and I have made certain decisions regarding the type of parents that we want to be. These decisions are ones that most people would describe as “crunchy” and include not vaccinating our children, not circumcising our son, extended breastfeeding, cloth diapering, co-sleeping, and homeschooling through such methods as Montessori, Waldorf and Unschooling.

Under unschooling, we follow our son’s lead. If, as we did recently, he shows an interest in crocodiles, then we get crocodile books and videos from the library and read through them and learn all about crocodiles. We do science experiments at home and that’s where Connolly’s book comes into the picture.

The Book of Totally Irresponsible Science is a book that is perfect for this kind of education. Connolly’s experiments are fun and exciting, easy to follow and even better, each one comes with a “Scientific Excuse” (as Connolly terms it) that links each experiment to the scientific principle that allows it to occur, making each one of these experiments the perfect learning opportunity.

Whether it is something as “old school” as dropping Mentos into diet cola or as exotic as making a self-propelled Viking funeral boat or causing a CFL bulb to light up using only a balloon and a head of hair, Connolly has put together a wonderful collection of fun and exciting scientific experiments for the homeschooler and backyard mad scientist alike, and I know that we will definitely be including Connolly’s experiments and explanations into our son and daughter’s homeschooling curriculum.

The Ayatollah Begs to Differ: The Paradox of Modern Iran

by Hooman Majd

(New York: Doubleday, 2008)
Hardcover, 273 Pages, Nonfiction

ISBN: 9780385523349, US$24.95

ABCD Rating: CHECK OUT

“Yeki-bood; yeki-nabood”

“There was a person (once upon a time); but on the other hand, no, there was no one.”

—Traditional opening in Persian oral stories

From the Cover: The grandson of an eminent ayatollah and the son of an Iranian diplomat, now an American citizen, Hooman Majd is, in a way, both 100 percent Iranian and 100 percent American, combining an insider’s knowledge of how Iran works with a remarkable ability to explain its history and its quirks to Western readers. In The Ayatollah Begs to Differ, he paints a portrait of a country that is fiercely proud of its Persian heritage, mystified by its outsider status, and scornful of the idea that the United States can dictate how it should interact with the community of nations. With wit, style, and an unusual ability to get past the typical sound bite on Iran, Majd reveals the paradoxes inherent in the Iranian character which have baffled Americans for more than thirty years. Meeting with sartorially challenged government officials in the presidential palace; smoking opium with an addicted cleric, his family, and friends; drinking fine whiskey at parties in fashionable North Tehran; and gingerly self-flagellating in a celebration of Ashura, Majd takes readers on a rare tour of Iran and shares insights shaped by his complex heritage. He considers Iran as a Muslim country, as a Shiite country, and, perhaps above all, as a Persian one. Majd shows that as Shi’ites marked by an inferiority complex, and Persians marked by a superiority complex, Iranians are fiercely devoted to protecting their rights, a factor that has contributed to their intransigence over their nuclear programs. He points to the importance of the Persian view of privacy, arguing that the stability of the current regime owes much to the freedom Iranians have to behave as they wish behind “Persian walls.” And with wry affection, Majd describes the Persian concept of ta’arouf, an exaggerated form of polite self-deprecation that may explain some of Iranian President Ahmadinejad’s more bizarre public moments. With unforgettable portraits of Iranians, from government figures to women cab drivers to reform-minded Ayatollahs, Majd brings to life a country that is deeply religious yet highly cosmopolitan, authoritarian yet with democratic and reformist traditions—an Iran that is a more nuanced nemesis to the United States than it is typically portrayed to be.

My Review: Yet another book that jumped off the NEW BOOK display at my local library and into my bag. It was even timelier, given the recent election and ensuing riots in Iran following Ahmadinejad’s re-election. I decided that I didn’t know enough about Iran, its history, its people, its culture and its government, and so I dug in.

Needless to say, The Ayatollah Begs to Differ paints a fascinating picture of Iran. Hooman Majd is uniquely connected to the Iranian government, as well as both the upper-, middle- and lower-classes of Iran and so is able to talk across socio-economic spectrums and present a fuller picture of Iran than the 24-hour news channels have presented lately. His insight into the Persian mind and way of thought is enlightening to say the least. With concepts of ta’arouf and the Persian belief in haq (or “rights”) Majd shows that the modern/average Persian is more concerned about obtaining a job and whether or not the government can fix the economy (Iran has one of the highest unemployment rates in the world) and not whether or not the Holocaust really occurred, whether or not women should be forced to wear hijabs or chadors, or if nuclear weapons are necessary for their national defense (though they do see the Iranian nuclear power program as haq).

Majd’s portrayal of Iran as a country of contradictions is very much at odds with the one that the American public has been fed through the media and the Bush Administration in the years following the terrorist attacks of September 11th. It is a portrait of a country that is at once modern and backwards, religious and secular, conservative and liberal. It is not, no matter what the Rumsfelds and Cheneys of the world would have us believe, a country of terrorist jihadists that want the death of the American way of life.

However, this is not to say that Majd’s point of view is valid and without fault. Being himself related to the Former President of Iran Mohammad Khatami, he falls a little too far into the camp of hero worship of the Former President (who, according to Majd defied the Ayatollahs and instituted many liberal reforms that Ahmadinejad’s administration rolled back) to be a fully “reliable” source of information, however, it is interesting to consider many of his points and the claims he makes, especially regarding Iranian cultural habits (such as ta’arouf and haq) and how they relate to the odd behavior and claims of Ahmadinejad.

Regardless of whether or not Majd is right in his assessment of Iran, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the Persian people, Iran is a country that we, as Americans, need to understand better as it is becoming a greater and greater power in the new world order. Majd’s book is a fascinating look at Iran from all sides, secular and religious, conservative and liberal, modern and historic.

You can watch Majd discuss his book with Jon Stewart on The Daily Show HERE.