Sunday, March 01, 2009

Bookshelf self defense

Well, here's the update on my attempts at overpowering my reading list.

I finished the one story in the Elric collection. Would've liked to read more, but I had to move on. I read four stories in the horror collection and was bored by all four, even the story by Robert Bloch. They just weren't of a vein that I like. Next came four of the five volumes of Green Lantern comics. These were great, thank you Jeph Loeb!

Currently I'm halfway through Stranger in a Strange Land. What a great book! My wife is also reading it and of course she's ahead of me, but that's normal. I'm pushing through the "extended version" not only because it's so good, but I really want to get to Watchmen.

Just when I thought I was doing well, TBR blind-sided me yesterday. I picked up and read the first page of Warren Ellis's Nextwave: Agents of H.A.T.E. trade paperback. Now I really want to re-read that. The 2-volume work is an irreverent collection of forgotten Marvel Comics characters who are thrown together as a covert ops team by an evil version of SHIELD (Marvel's 'big brother' version of the CIA). Well, since they're heroes, even forgotten, 2-bit heroes, they turn on their keepers and commit themselves to bringing down the organization or at the very least, being a pain in its beauracratic bum. It's humorous AND fun, written as only Warren Ellis can write (no one mocks the establishment like that grizzled prat!) and drawn perfectly by Stuart Immonen (a danged find draw-er in his own right).

Listening to: Clutch "Robot Hive/Exodus"