Friday Flashback: Rec. #128: Day for Night

I decided to start doing Friday Flashbacks in case you missed some early posts the first time around. You're busy; I understand.

What: Frederick Reiken's intricate web of a novel, Day for Night, is every bit as beautiful as that cover. We start with manatees. We end with some semi-coherent journal entries from a Nazi in exile. Some of the stops along the way are: researchers at an animal preserve in Israel, a coma patient who gets kidnapped, and two FBI agents on the trail of an enigmatic woman. Amazingly, the connections among them are not contrived or cutesy. On the contrary; they make the world of the novel seem bright and big and scary and lovely.

Comparable to: Reiken makes connections here just as David Mitchell does in Cloud Atlas --- across continents and times, but very naturally. There's also a slight whiff of early Tom Robbins around the edges.

Opening lines: "'They're around here,' said our guide, as we slowly motored up the Homosassa River. It was late afternoon, a mildly sunny day in midwinter. My boyfriend David, his son Jordan, and I wore wetsuits, which we had rented along with snorkeling equipment."

Representative quote: "You may get scared sometimes because you fail to understand that what is scared is not you. It's the story. The story looks for a way to travel. The story is afraid you will let it go."

You might not like it if: You are hoping for a neat and tidy resolution. Connections are made on top of connections, layers are added to layers, and although we see where many of the threads of the story lead, not everything is tied in a bow at the end.

How to get it: It's new enough that you should be able to find it in most bookstores. It's also Kindle-able.

[Originally posted 5/18/11.]

Connections to now-previous Wreckage: David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas was Rec. #140.

Rec. #225 (abbrev.): The Lady Vanishes

What: Hitchcock non-blonde film, trans-European train, snow, Bandrika, village hotel, disguises, cricket, passengers, codes, maids, brain surgeon, yodeling, governess, delay, cricket, bandages, high heels, Boris, glasses, nuns, avalanche, music scholar, espionage, missing person who was never there

Opening lines:
"What's all this fuss about, Charters?"
"Damned if I know."

Representative quote: "I've no regrets. I've been everywhere and done everything. I've eaten caviar at Cannes, sausage rolls at the dogs. I've played baccarat at Biarritz and darts with the rural dean. What is there left for me but marriage?"

Connections to previous Wreckage: More Hitchcock! Rope (Rec. #5), Shadow of a Doubt (Rec. #78), Family Plot (Rec. #120), The Trouble with Harry (Rec. #145), Strangers on a Train (Rec. #166), Spellbound (Rec. #185)

Also, it's worth noting that actress Kristen Bell bears an uncanny resemblance to Margaret Lockwood, the star of The Lady Vanishes. See for yourself by following this up with Veronica Mars (Rec. #168).

Rec. #224: The Fountain Overflows

What: With this semi-autobiographical novel, Rebecca West introduces the talented and eccentric Aubrey family. When the book opens, at the beginning of the twentieth century, Mr. Aubrey has once again vowed a fresh start, this time in the London suburbs. Mrs. Aubrey manages the constant flow of music, literature, and politics through the house, while stemming the tide of financial ruin. And the four children --- three daughters and a son --- they soak it all up.

Comparable to: Rebecca West presents the same kind of watchful, rich sweep of the early twentieth century in The Fountain Overflows as Rose Macaulay does in Told by an Idiot.

Opening lines: "There was such a long pause that I wondered whether my Mamma and my Papa were ever going to speak again. Not that I feared they had quarreled, only we children had quarrels, but they had each fallen into a dream. Then Papa said hesitantly, 'You know, I am very sorry about all this, my dear.'"

Representative quote: "Now, he told me, I could see what humanity was worth. It could form the conception of justice, but could not trust its flesh to provide judges. Whatever it started was likely to end in old men raving."

You might not like it if: All the discussions of innate musical ability make your tone-deaf self frantic with envy.

How to get it: Buy it or borrow it. Not currently Kindle-able.

Connection to previous Wreckage: As I mentioned above, Rose Macaulay's Told By an Idiot (Rec. #181) is a very similar sort of book. Rose Macaulay is funnier, though.

Friday Flashback: Rec. #118: Ripple Effect

I decided to start doing Friday Flashbacks in case you missed some early posts the first time around. You're busy; I understand.

What: This volume collects Elaine Equi's poems from more than two decades. The poems are, delightfully, mostly focused on the consumption of popular culture. This, and their witty tone, means they are rocky good fun.

Comparable to: Heaven help us, one reviewer described Equi's work as "sassy." Don't do that.

Representative quote: "History/ makes/ many bad movies."

You might not like it if: You look to poetry for contemplations of nature. Not much nature here.

How to get it: In print; buying online might be your best bet.

Connections to previous Wreckage: On a poetry kick? Also check out Wislawa Szymborksa's Monologue of a Dog (Rec. #19) and Kay Ryan's The Best of It (Rec. #50).

[Originally posted 5/3/11.]

Rec. #223: Bill Cunningham New York

What: Bill Cunningham, the subject of this documentary, is many things. He's a noted fashion photographer in New York City. He's a grown-up boy on a bike. He's the eye behind the New York Times "On the Street" columns. He's an eccentric who lived in the same studio apartment for fifty years and wears the same outfit every day. He's an idealist who won't accept free drinks. He's a man who should have been played by Jimmy Stewart.

Comparable to: Fashion documentaries are very big these days! (The September Issue, Valentino: The Last Emperor, L'Amour Fou, Yves Saint Laurent, Christian Dior: The Man Behind the Myth, Lagerfeld Confidential, etc.)

This doc, however, has much more in common with Public Speaking, a portrait of another stubborn New York eccentric, Fran Lebowitz. 

Representative quote: "If you don't take money, they can't tell you what to do. That's the key to the whole thing."

You might not like it if: You get so anxious about this frail-looking octogenarian riding his bike around the streets of New York City without a helmet.

How to get it: It's available to watch instantly on Netflix.

Connection to previous Wreckage: Fran Lebowitz's essay collection Metropolitan Life was Rec. #188.

Friday Flashback: Rec. #95: Hark! A Vagrant

I decided to start doing Friday Flashbacks in case you missed some early posts the first time around. You're busy; I understand.

What: Are you amazed and/or alarmed that it's taken me three months to spotlight Kate Beaton? You should be. Kate Beaton is a heroine of the web comics community. On her blog, Hark! A Vagrant, she specializes in Beaton-ized snapshots of history (Napoleon eating cookies, a dating show for Elizabeth I) that are as meticulously researched as they are irreverent. (Without the knowledge from the research, the irreverence wouldn't be so spot on.) She also gives us "younger self" comics, mystery solving teens, some general nonsense, comics about dead authors, and --- oh yeah --- a fat pony.

Representative comic (actually most are longer, but this gives you a taste):

You might not like it if: You find it criminally unfair that she can make squiggly lines that become perfectly nuanced facial expressions, while the squiggly lines you make just look like squiggly lines.

How to get it: Kate Beaton is all over the place, thank goodness. First, there's her blog. She's also on Twitter (@beatonna), and she often shares quick sketches there. Plus, there's a store where you can buy, among other things, prints of many of her comics and some excellent t-shirts. And also, she has a new book that will be released in September. You can pre-order it on Amazon.

[Originally posted 4/4/11.]

[Beaton's book ended up being a huge, whopping success, by the way.]

Friday Flashback: Rec. #112: Tristram Shandy --- A Cock and Bull Story

I decided to start doing Friday Flashbacks in case you missed some early posts the first time around. You're busy; I understand.

What: When you try to film an unfilmable novel, you have a few options. 1) You can put blinders on and forge ahead with your adaptation while yelling, "La la la, I can't hear yoooouuu!" 2) You can alter the story to such a degree that it no longer resembles the original source material. 3) Or you can choose the path that Michael Winterbottom did and go all meta. 

Tristram Shandy is, yes, based on the novel The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne. But really it's a movie about making a movie based on the novel The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne, and how utterly impossible it is.

Comparable to: Charlie Kaufman? Are you sure you weren't involved in this?

Representative quote: "This was a post-modern classic written way before there was any modern to be post about."

You might not like it if: You can't stand self-referential loops like Steve Coogan playing Steve Coogan playing Tristram Shandy (and also his father, Walter).

How to get it: Easy to find the DVD. And, if you're interested, the book is in the public domain.

Connections to previous Wreckage: We have a Brit actor extravaganza here. A quick sample of the cast: Keeley Hawes, who was in a miniseries adaption of the Dickens novel Our Mutual Friend (Rec. #88); Dylan Moran, star of the series Black Books (Rec. #68); Kelly Macdonald, who was in State of Play (Rec. #104); Shirley Henderson, from Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself (Rec. #108); and Rob Brydon, who is absolutely delightful in Gavin and Stacey (Rec. # . . . wait, I haven't done that yet?!).

Special note: The U.K. title of the film is the U.S. subtitle --- A Cock and Bull Story. Presumably they changed it because they thought U.S. audiences would get too giggly about the original title. Frankly, though, Michael Winterbottom probably has other things to worry about.

[Originally posted 4/25/11.]

Friday Flashback: Rec. #100: To Say Nothing of the Dog

I decided to start doing Friday Flashbacks in case you missed some early posts the first time around. You're busy; I understand.

What: It's the middle of the twenty-first century. Ned Henry and Verity Kindle are historians and, in 2057, that means they do a lot of time traveling. Ned and Verity have been taken from their usual work and conscripted to retrieve the elusive bishop's bird stump (don't worry; they don't know what it is, either). They've been working separate angles --- Ned in the 1940s and Verity in the Victorian age. Once their paths cross, they have to contend with obstacles like time-lag, jumble sales, World War II, a false medium, brief stopovers in 1395 and 1933, slippage, and a menace named Lady Schrapnell. Just to name a few.

It's a comedy of manners. It's science fiction. It's a farce. It's a meditation on chaos theory. It's a satire. It's a puzzlebox mystery. It's layers of literary allusion. It's a broad sweep of historical drama. It's one of those rare books that just makes you happy to be alive, and not for anything that at all resembles maudlin drivel.

Comparable to: Not exactly like anything else, but a little like almost everything.

Representative quote: "History was indeed controlled by blind forces, as well as character and courage and treachery and love. And accident and random chance. And stray bullets and telegrams and tips. And cats."

You might not like it if: You actually think this book is about retrieving the bishop's bird stump.

How to get it: Buy it, either paper or digital. Also, could someone please convince a Coralie Bickford-Smith-ish designer to do a new, gorgeous edition of this book? (I wouldn't say no to other books by Connie Willis, either.) I would buy so many copies.

[Originally posted 4/10/11.]

Rec. #222 (abbrev.): The Headhunters

What: Murder mystery by Peter Lovesey, hypothetical "I could kill my boss" game gone wrong, double date, dead body on a beach, the Slug and Lettuce, missing colleague, fossils, Hen Mallin, gardening center, flood, CID, bowling, printing company, Mill Pond, woolly mammoth

Opening lines: "'I could cheerfully murder my boss,' said Gemma."

Representative quote: "On another website Jo was startled to see her own name. Little else was accurate. Described as a resident of Selsey (wrong), she was supposed to have stumbled over the body (she didn't stumble over anything) whilst exercising her dogs (what dogs?) on Medmerry Beach (East Beach). A salutary reminder not to believe everything on the internet."

Connection to previous Wreckage: The Headhunters is very good fun, but The Reaper (Rec. #21) --- also by Peter Lovesey --- is a triumph.