Paul is Undead

Title: Paul is Undead - The British ZomBie Invasion
Author: Alan Goldsher
Illustrator: Jeffrey Brown
Published: 2010 by Gallery Books
Genre: Investigative music journalism
Pages: 310


I'm not a big fan of the Beatles; I've seen the Yellow Submarine countless times as a kid, and I know all the big hits, but don't consider myself a fan. Still, a book about them as zombies, except for Ringo who's a Seventh Level Ninja Lord, with Mick Jagger as a zombie hunter, and many, many other celebraties as guest stars... how's one supposed not to read it?

John Lennon was turned into a zombie as a newborn, and grew up to be a man with a mission: to start a band and become the Toppermost of the Poppermost, whatever that means. He eventually meets a nice, talented musician called Paul McCartney, and turns him. George Harrison follows much the same way, and once they attract the attention of the Ninja Lord Ringo Starr, we're making alternative history.

Goldsher interviewed all the members of the band, plus others like Mr. Jagger, Brian Epstein, Roy Orbison, and many who worked with the band, and gathered their tales into the Beatles' history until their break-up in 1969. I'm fairly sure that if I knew more about the real Beatles' history, I might've gotten even more out of the book, but it was still hilarious and I found myself giggling several times in the bus on my way home. Comics artist Jeffrey Brown has illustrated the book very... oh gosh. Some of the pictures actually made me squeamish! Which was nice.


RINGO STARR: Maybe it was because I was the last one to join the group, or maybe it was because I wasn't a zombie, but I sometimes felt like the band's whipping boy. Think about it: If I'm not picking up their fallen testicles, I'm wrapping duct tape around their naked bodies. And how many songs do they let me sing per album? One, that's how many.
On the plus side, that was the last time I ever had to handle Lennon's and McCartney's boy parts.

Angels in America

Title: Angels in America
Author: Tony Kushner
Published: This edition in 2011 by NHB, originally from 1992 onwards.
Genre: Inner cover says A Gay Fantasia on National Themes
Pages: 293 (includes afterwords and abouts and such)


Ooh, this is post n:o 98 into this blog, apparently! Let's see if I can get it up to 100 before the new year.

Right! Angels in America! In text form, as a play script. I didn't see the miniseries until this year, but I loved it immediately. Santa was nice enough to bring me this, and I read it pretty much immediately. I also got the series on DVD. Thank you, Santa!

So, what's it about. Set mostly in 1986, AIDS is still pretty much a death sentence, and Prior, sick with the nasty thing, isn't happy about it. His boyfriend Louis is absolutely terrified. Among the main cast are also Joe and Harper, a Mormon married couple, plus Joe's mother Hannah. Harper is addicted to Valium, and Joe kinda fancies men. Hannah is not impressed. Belize, nurse and former drag queen, and Roy, an utter bastard. Oh, there are a lot of other character, including, of course, the Angel who comes through Prior's bedroom ceiling one night and informs him that he's the Prophet.

The play comes in two parts, Millennium Approaches, and Perestroika. This book includes a list of the actors and directors of the play's professional productions, along with staging notes and such. Being mostly dialogue, it was a quick -and a very enjoyable- read. Very humorous, too.

"
PRIOR: You misheard. I'm a Prophet.
JOE: What?
PRIOR: PROPHET PROPHET I PROPHESY I HAVE SIGHTS I SEE. What do you do?
JOE: I'm a clerk.
PRIOR: Oh big deal. A clerk. You what, you file things? Well you better be keeping a file on the hearts you break, that's all that counts in the end, you'll have bills to pay in the world to come, you and your friend, the Whore of Babylon.
(Pause)
Sorry wrong room.
"

A Storm of Swords

Title: A Storm of Swords (1: Steel and Snow & 2: Blood and Gold)
Author: George R. R. Martin
Published: This print in 2011 by Harper Voyager, orig. in 2000
Genre: Fantasy. Epic fantasy.
Pages: 569 + 554 + a whole lotta appendixes. Appendi?


Right! The third part of the epic Song of Ice and Snow, such a brick that it had to be divided into two bricks so that it won't fall apart under its own weight. I can imagine, though, that a hard-cover version of both in one would have made for some strong-armed readers. And concussions, if read in bed.

Anyhoo, I tried to take it slow with the first part, but by the time I got to the second (I tried to take a break in between, to make the series last longer before the inevitable wait of the 6th and 7th book) I was on such a roll that I finished it in about a week.

The bunch of kings from the second book gets shuffled around like a deck of cards, and epic weddings all around. And epic pie-eating, which... wasn't as dirty as it sounded when said out loud. Ma-haaaaan. Had I not been sitting in a bus I would've given that one a standing ovation. And there's scary things in the dark and dragons and I keep getting distracted and can't really figure out a way to come up with a way to sum up all the so many plots and characters.

But I've decided -and I mean it this time- that I'm gonna wait until next year to read the 4th book, since the 5th's coming out as a paperback around March. I'm going to buy them all as paperbacks. Stay tuned to see this plan fall flat on its face the day book 6 comes out!


"You know nothing, Jon Snow."


Oh, and now I get the looks I got when I commented to someone who'd read all the existing books on how I liked the fact that dead people stay DEAD in these books. I get the looks now.