Yesterday 01/05/2013  I traded in my 1997 Dodge Caravan Sport with 188,600 miles and a leaky transmission for a 2006 Saturn Vue with 53,923 miles for $9250. 

They gave me $300 for the van (essentially scrap metal and parts) and I put a decent deposit down and was able to get financed for a decent monthly payment.

The Saturn is a 5 speed manual transmission and has many other bells and whistles I have not even figured out yet.

Favorite Writers

Lately, when I have not been reading comics, I've been reading short story collections. The list below are some of my favorite writers from over the years but a number of them are recent finds and some are those that work in the short story form.

I like the short story form, especially the styles of those on the list below. I used to write short stories and I think at times that I want to get back to doing that again.

Of course, being the procrastinator that I am...who knows when that'll start.

Richard Brautigan

Brautigans short stories, novels and poetry are among my all time favorite fiction. I was a teenager who had just graduated from reading science fiction, fantasy and horror to finding the work of Kurt Vonnegut. Expressing my love for this new found style of fiction, a friend loaned me a copy of Trout Fishing in America and nothing was ever the same afterwards.

Charles Bukowski

Don't try...

Kurt Vonnegut

So it goes...

Jack Kerouac

One day I will find the right words, and they will be simple... 

Haruki Murakami

I came upon Japanese writer Haruki Murakami fairly late with the 2002 release of his novel Kafka on the Shore. I could not put the book down and afterwards I tracked down a lot of his other novels like one of my favorites The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.

Etgar Keret

A frequent contributor on This American Life (and good friends with Ira Glass). The movie Wristcutters: A Love Story was based on a short story by Etgar called "Knellers Happy Campers" which was how I was introduced to his work. I found the short story collection The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and other stories, which is where "Knellers Happy Campers" was in. From there my local Library had a lot of his books like The Girl on the Fridge and The Nimrod Flipout

Raymond Carver

Another writer I didn't find until later but I loved the sparse prose of his haunting short stories in Will You Please Be Quiet, Please.

Ben Loory

I heard a short story read on the Valentines Day episode of This American LIfe written by Ben Loory about a duck who fell in love with a rock. From there I found his book Stories for the Nighttime and Some for the Day at the Library. I fell in love with this book of dark, funny and weird short stories.

Aimee Bender

Another writer I found on This American Life which lead me to her book The Girl in the Flammable Skirt which I found at the Library. I loved her short stories and I plan to read more of her work.

Jeanne Darst

On the same Valentines Day episode of This American LIfe was a piece written and read by the author Jeanne Darst from her memoir Fiction Ruined My Family the piece and her whole book was wildly funny.

Thomas Pynchon

The Crying of Lot 49 

Tom Robbins

Still Life with Woodpecker, Even Cowgirls Get The Blues and Another Roadside Attraction

Jim Thompson

I love pulp and crime fiction but nobody did it quite like Jim Thompson did with books like The Killer Inside Me, After Dark, My Sweet, A Hell of a Woman and The Grifters. He wrote about the underbelly of society in such a way that is completely unforgettable.

Dashiell Hammett

Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon and The Continental Op in Red Harvest and The Dain Curse and of course The Glass Key.

Raymond Chandler

The Big Sleep, The Long Goodbye and Farewell, My Lovely

Who Is Jake Ellis?

The real question here is not "Who is Jake Ellis" but who is Nathan Edmondson?

I read a lot and for years now I’ve read a lot of comics (or graphic novels, illustrated stories, whatever you want to call them, they're still comics). I read the heroic stuff put out by the likes of DC, Marvel, Image, etc... I also read a lot of the independent stuff from Top Shelf, Fantagraphics and Drawn & Quarterly too.


I found that I can enjoy the stories about a guy wearing a mask and a cape as well as I can about a guy working as a file clerk in Cleveland. After reading a lot of comics, good and bad, I found that I followed the writers of the comics more than I did the licensed characters. I followed writers no matter what their subject was because they could TELL a story and they knew how to use the medium of comics.

What I learned in the years of reading comics is that a great comic writer can create something as compelling and deep as anything done in the literary field and combined with talented artist can make something you can go back to over and over again.

“Watchmen” by written by Alan Moore and drawn by Dave Gibbons is a perfect example of this.

"Who is Jake Ellis?" written by Nathan Edmondson and art by Tonci Zonjić is yet another perfect example. I hope to see more from both of these talents but especially more stories of this depth by the likes of Nathan Edmondson.


The description of the book can be found listed online everywhere and even a few sample pages on NPR so I wont bother with the details only that it was am engaging and compelling story.

Highly Recommended!

Link to book on CML website

Link to book on Amazon

Today's thought...

"Rap is something you do, hip-hop is something you live"

KRS-One

Bob C Musgrave

Batman: Ualuealuealeuale

http://ualuealuealeuale.ytmnd.com/

NPR.org - Holiday: The Godfather Of Hip-Hops Last Gift

Bob C Musgrave thought you would be interested in this story: Holiday: The Godfather Of Hip-Hops Last Gift
http://www.npr.org/2012/01/10/144906402/holiday-the-godfather-of-hip-hops-last-gift?sc=emaf

This message was included:

I am sending this to myself (posting to my blog) so I look up this book from the Library later...

*Listen/Watch on NPR.org*
Many stories at NPR.org have audio or visual content. When you visit the link
above, look for a "Listen" or "Watch" button.
For technical support, please visit NPR's Audio/Visual Help page:
http://help.npr.org/npr/consumer/kbdetail.asp?kbid=152

Batman Gets His Groove On

http://adamwestparty.ytmnd.com/

Bob C Musgrave

This is EXACTLY how picking a tree goes for us too...

via Cul de Sac - ArcaMax Publishing on 12/20/11

"We Miss You, Bill"


http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=pq8iyhMFLYE

New look to the Blog...

I decided on a new look for the Blog, let me know how you like it (if you like it).


-Bob C Musgrave

What I'm reading

This is the list of books I currently have out from the Columbus Metropolitan Library which boasts a really great selection of comics, cartoons and graphic novels. I tend to get a lot out after reading reviews or hearing of new collections or Trade Paperbacks of works by writers and artists I like. I get way more out then I can even read at a time and renew them until I do get a chance to read them.


I'll post some links to the books on the Library website and some reviews and I may post a separate list for some of the comics I've been buying at The Laughing Ogre as well.



Incorruptible Volume 2 / Waid, Mark


Incorruptible Volume 3 / Waid, Mark


Solomon Kane. The castle of the devil / Allie, Scott.


Flight / Volume 8


Echo : the complete edition / Moore, Terry


The rocketeer : the complete adventures / Stevens, Dave


The last council / Kibuishi, Kazu


The Bride of Hell and others / Mignola, Michael


Robin. Year one / Dixon, Chuck


The bulletproof coffin / Hine, David


Funny misshapen body : [a memoir] / Brown, Jeffrey


Supergod / Ellis, Warren


iZombie. 01, Dead to the world / Roberson, Chris


Skullkickers. 1000 opas and a dead body / Zubkavich, J


King of the flies. 2, The origin of the world / Mezz


King of the flies. 1, Hallorave / Mezzo


iZombie. 02, uVampire / Roberson, Chris


The finder library Volume 1 / McNeil, Carla Speed


Joe the barbarian : the deluxe edition / Morrison, Grant


Undeleted scenes / Brown, Jeffrey


The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen : century : 1910 Moore, Alan


The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen : century : 1969 Moore, Alan


Becoming Batman : the possibility of a superhero / Zehr

Bored, Bored, Bored...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfjGRBFd7mQ

Good thing I don't own a cricket bat.

Bob C Musgrave