Peter and Max: A Fables Novel by Bill Willingham
And it was also
Peter is the famed Peter Piper, and Max is his elder brother. The story cuts back and forth between the original invasion of the Emperor and later in the Mundy world.
It’s a fine story, weaving in Bo Peep and her sheep, the Pied Piper, and some other Fable references. It won’t win any literature prizes, but good mind candy.
The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Well, it wasn’t near as bad as I had remembered from High School. In fact, it was just fine. My only complaint is that there was too little Sherlock Holmes in it.
The narrative problem, I’m assuming, with having Holmes in the entirety of a full-length novel, is that he’s simply going to solve the mystery too fast. If you want to stretch the story into a full length book, you really have to have Watson on his own semi-bumbling through the mystery as in this novel, or you have to insert a big stretch of backstory (as in A Study in Scarlet).
Otherwise, you’ve got to make the mystery really complicated, with many layers of the onion. But that requires blowing a lot of ideas on one story. Best to stretch it out over several books, I imagine, and pad, pad, pad.
So, if a second reading through the prism of my 38 year old eyes redeemed The Hound of the Baskervilles, does this mean I need to revisit Great Expectations?
A Study in Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
This is the first Sherlock Holmes mystery, written purportedly while Conan Doyle was not-busy being an unsuccessful doctor.
It gives us the origins of how Holmes and Watson met (entirely invalidating the Young Sherlock Holmes movie from the 80’s). It is odd in that Holmes is entirely absent from the middle section of the book. This section is a somewhat abrupt jump back in time to give some background story on the mystery in question.
The middle section is also quite an unflattering portrayal of Brigham Young, and the Latter-day Saints colony in Utah of the time. I can’t imagine the Mormons were (or are) big fans of Conan Doyle.
The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
So, as far as I can tell, here we have the first mention of Professor Moriarty in “The Final Problem”. Also, Sherlock’s older, smarter, but lazier brother Mycroft in “The Greek Interpreter”.
I guess what I find surprising is that Professor Moriarty only makes an appearance in two stories of the canon., which are really two parts of the same story. I guess from popular culture, I had thought he would be a continuous presence, akin to Silas Greenback in the Danger Mouse canon.
Stories in this collection
Silver Blaze
The yellow face
The stock-broker’s clerk
The “Gloria Scott”
The Musgrave ritual
The Reigate puzzle
The crooked man
The resident patient
The Greek interpreter
The naval treaty
The final problem
The Return of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
The third collection of short stories about the “amateur” detective. I should have read The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes first, as the first story in this collection contains spoilers from that previous set, but past is past.
I look forward to continuing my journey through the canon.
How To Survive A Robot Uprising: TIps On Defending Yourself Against The Coming Rebellion by Daniel H. Wilson
This book is played more or less straight. There’s very little in the way of “jokes”, and what there are are negligible.
There is some real information on the state of robotics today, and what current robots are capable of doing, and thoughts on how to defeat the capabilities.
In the end, I wouldn’t recommend the book. Probably, the same info could be gleaned from looking for robot videos on YouTube.
Wishful Drinking by Carrie Fisher
Stacey got me this for Xmas for no reason whatsoever, except that Carrie Fisher was in Star Wars, The Blues Brothers and When Harry Met Sally, all of which I love.
This book is based on a one-woman show by Ms. Fisher, and it shows. It’s a stand up routine written down; You can feel where the pause-for-laughters were thrown in.
It’s a quick read, with some interesting anecdotes, though none about Sally or Blues Brothers.