Books
Five Things (Kittens?) I Learned From Street Boners by Gavin McInnes
Amy Rose Spiegel :: Wednesday, May 12th, 2010 2:50 pm
“Hipster hipster hipster fashion hipster hipsterdom.” Essentially, this is the message I took away from the back cover of Street Boners, the upcoming fashion joke book by Gavin McInnes. Somehow he fails to see the irony of when in the introduction of the book, he asks, “Can we stop talking about hipsters now?” and then proceeds to do just that for 339 pages. (But, hey, isn’t irony the language all true hipsters are fluent in, anyway? Maybe he does understand the youth today!) Talking about hipsters, which McInnes describes as “a young enthusiast of contemporary, alternative, pop culture,” is his specialty, so no, he apparently can’t stop talking about hipsters now, or ever, for that matter. McInnes has based a career on first penning the DOs and DON’Ts feature for Vice Magazine, then doing the similar Street Boners section for his website, Street Boners and TV Carnage. Here is my five-kitten rating for this book, which each kitten representing a point that I took away from his collection of snarky missives. MORE »
Books
Philip K. Dick’s Exegesis To Be Released Next Year
Johnny Sanford :: Thursday, April 29th, 2010 1:15 pm
Philip K. Dick is something of an enigma. The science-fiction author is purported to have had a series of “visions” in the late seventies and died only four months before the film Blade Runner came out, to critical acclaim and box-office success. Though he did achieve success while he was writing, he came to world-wide acclaim with films like Minority Report, Total Recall, Screamers, and A Scanner Darkly. But now, something even more intriguing is to be released: Exegesis. The work is set to be released next year in two volumes, and it is being edited and compiled by Jonathan Lethem and Pamela Jackson, a Philip K. Dick scholar. The work unedited stands at over 8,000 pages, and it chronicles Dick’s attempts to understanding the visions he was having in the 70’s. MORE »
Books, Celebrities
Marilyn Monroe, Soon-To-Be Published Author
Amy Rose Spiegel :: Wednesday, April 28th, 2010 1:30 pm
In October, Farrar, Straus & Giroux will publish Fragments, a book of uncollected writing by Marilyn Monroe. It’s reported to include poetry, letters, previously unreleased photographs, and other work. Monroe had a notorious (if somewhat superficial) obsession with literature and poetry, and this book may be a reflection of that interest. I’m sure that no matter the quality of the writing itself, it’ll be an engaging insight into one of America’s most recognizable icons.
Books, Politics
Folks, Let’s Help Glenn Beck!
Danielle Johnsen :: Tuesday, April 13th, 2010 5:39 pm
Yes, you read that correctly. I want to help the $32 Million “average joe” pick out the book cover for his latest thriller. The partiot every man talk show host will soon add political thriller novelist to his many titles with his upcoming book, titled ‘The Overton Window‘. And he needs YOU! MORE »
Books
Review: “Just Before The Black,” James Franco’s Debut Short Story
Amy Rose Spiegel :: Friday, March 26th, 2010 4:20 pm
James Franco is one of America’s few real Movie Stars. He’s got an easy, refined charm about him both onscreen and off. He dedicates himself to each role he plays to great success. Oh, and he’s the living definition of the word “dashing,” as so many young women’s bedroom-wall decor reflects. This reputation was pervasive as I read “Just Before The Black,” his first published short story, which appears in this month’s Esquire. MORE »
Books, Incomparable Gentleman
New David Foster Wallace Archive At University Of Texas!
Amy Rose Spiegel :: Wednesday, March 10th, 2010 2:00 pm
Postmodern author and iconoclast David Foster Wallace, who died prematurely in 2008 at the age of 46, was an avid annotator. Even in its published form, his writing was adorned with ample footnotes and clarifications, so it’s no wonder that the margins of his collection of books and personal documents are completely marked up. I know this thanks to the Harry Ransom Center at University of Texas Austin, whose new archive of some of his possessions promises fresh insight into one of the true recent geniuses of our literary history.
Books, Celebrities
Second Lady Gaga Comic Book To Be Released
Amy Rose Spiegel :: Wednesday, February 3rd, 2010 5:55 pm
In October 2009, Marc Jacobs stores sold Lady Gaga-centric comic books for two dollars a pop. The small book was a short, witty piece that focused less on Gaga’s history and more on the Lady’s famously freaky penchant for high fashion. The illustrations, drawn by the artist Brian Enersen, were very simple and sketched in stark black lines. An upcoming comic book, titled “Fame: Lady Gaga,” is another approach to portraying the singer in pictures.
The two covers for the book, featured today on MTV News, are full-color portraits of Lady Gaga. The comic book itself is supposedly biographical. It’s slated to be released in May. Nerdy, comic-book-lovin’ pop enthusiasts, take note.
Books, art
Calvin And Hobbes Creator And Comic (Strip) Genius Bill Watterson’s First Interview In 20 Years
Amy Rose Spiegel :: Wednesday, February 3rd, 2010 2:50 pm
For me and so many others, the comic strip “Calvin and Hobbes” has always been essential reading. I obsessively collected the anthologies as a kid. I still have most of them today, which is the only reason I haven’t purchased the beautiful collection of every strip, from beginning to end, which was released in recent years. When I lived with my boyfriend last winter, we would joke about the fact that there was a “Calvin and Hobbes” book (sometimes two) in every room of the apartment at all times, which we neither planned nor minded one bit. We’d read them in the kitchen as we waited for things to come out of the oven, on the couch in the living room, or on our stomachs on the bed. They were always freshly funny and often poignant, despite how many times during the course of our lives we had read them.
