Tag: 2012

The Second Most Dangerous Job in America by Steve Himmer

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This e-book short (57 pages) from author Steve Himmer reads like some hybrid of novel and memoir, so clear and realistic are the experiences related by the protagonist. Set up in 50 short chapters that each more or less detail an individual encounter, the book is like a bunch of anecdotes told by a friend.

The Second Most Dangerous Job in America is what one assumes is a semi-autobiographical account of the odd and dispiriting experiences of an undergrad staffing the local 24-hour convenience store, working the counter in the middle of the night/morning. The unnamed main character is on summer break from college, and his chronicle of the depressing mundanity of the task will no doubt be uncomfortably familiar to anyone who’s spent time in a job they didn’t care to do or take seriously. Because, to the credit of the author, he isn’t being insulting to the work as a career choice; these are merely the way these experiences present themselves to someone punching the clock unengagingly. While he paints sometimes unflattering portraits of the night creatures that wander through this fluorescent oasis, there’s no mean-spiritedness at play here. The book is simply an account of the sort of things that can happen in the middle of the night in a small college town that has discharged all of the students for a few months.

Confused drunks, manky hookers, indie rockers and other refugees from a Tom Waits album pass through the sliding doors, depositing wisdom, loose change and random expletive-filled proclamations before vacating the store, leaving the young man alone once more. It’s really story of solitude, very much in keeping with the author’s first novel, The Bee-Loud Glade: A Novel.

The sheer banality of the repetitive interactions and quiet hours are implicit, made obvious from the weariness of the character rather than the reader having to experience first hand. The Second Most Dangerous Job in America is a marvel of efficiency; the author is able to utilize the reader’s familiarity of the the carbon copy convenience store setting and cut straight to quick musings interspersed with exchanges with the eccentric clientele.

The book is a quick read – the first time I read it I tore through it on one train ride. It’s fun to revisit, as well. There’s a familiarity to the writing not unlike the moment you step through the doors and the bell dings and you realize that no matter where you are or how long it’s been, the convenience store is always the same, forever…

[schema type=”book” url=”http://stevehimmer.com/” name=”The Second Most Dangerous Job In America” description=”The Second Most Dangerous Job In America chronicles a young man’s long, dark nights of the soul working graveyard shift in a convenience store, featuring minor celebrities, bargain brand cigarettes, and cup after cup of bad coffee. It’s a microcosmic meditation on work, self, and ambition set against a comic backdrop of mid-1990s fatalism. About the Author Steve Himmer is the author of the novels The Bee-Loud Glade, Fram, and Scratch (coming 2016). His short stories, essays, and reviews have appeared in The Millions, Ploughshares online, Post Road, Los Angeles Review, Hobart, and other anthologies and journals. He edits the webjournal Necessary Fiction teaches at Emerson College in Boston, Massachusetts.” author=”Steve Himmer” publisher=”Atticus Books” pubdate=”2012-01-13″ isbn=”984040528″ ebook=”yes” ]

Pines by Blake Crouch

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Wow. What an amazing book.

I’m really enjoying my reading lately – I just keep bouncing from author to author. I’ve never been so open to suggestion. I read a thriller or sci-fi novel, love it, and see who the author rubs shoulders with. So many of these writers play in each others sandboxes. I always loved guys like William Gibson & Neal Stephenson, and Ernest Cline & Wil Wheaton turned me on to John Scalzi. Hugh Howey’s worlds led me to Jason Gurley, Michael Bunker and Marcus Sakey, from which I got to Brett Battles and now Blake Crouch.

Most of the time these are authors I’m already aware of; Scalzi’s Redshirts was on my wish list for years before I finally read it. But it’s when I see the same names popping up it convinces me to take the plunge. (I should point out that I am quite a slow reader, so I put more thought into what I’m going to read than some might. My kindle is filled with books I haven’t gotten to yet…)

In the case of Pines, I’d seen this popping up with increasing frequency based on my recent reads, which convinced me to give it a try even though it appeared to be a bit out of my usual areas of interest; by which I mean it looked like horror. I’m not a big horror fan, so the thriller aspects of a horror story have to be very compelling to keep me engaged past my squeamishness comfort level. Compelling is certainly a good word for Pines…

Pines tells the tale of Secret Service Agent and Gulf War veteran Ethan Burke, who finds himself in the rustic town of Wayward Pines, a slice of Rockwellian Americana nestled in the mountains of Idaho. He came there to investigate the disappearance of two agents, but a brutal car accident has killed his partner and left him a confused wreck with partial amnesia. He can’t locate his belongings, his identification or anyone who seems completely sane. The more he learns the less he knows, but he is certain of one thing: this place is dangerously strange…

Intentionally filled with the atmospheric influence of Twin Peaks, Pines (the 1st book in the Wayward Pines trilogy) does indeed have an eerie quality, although I’m not sure I’d call the novel horror. There’s a “something is very wrong here” vibe to everything, and from that environment and the descriptions, your interest may not be totally piqued. I found the beginning of the novel to be interesting but a bit familiar. But things changed quickly.

I may never have read a book to which the word momentum so readily comes to mind. The book starts off a little slowly, but I didn’t realize it was because a train takes a while to get to the top of the mountain. I was steadily more drawn in as the protagonist begins to get a grip on what’s happening, but when it hit the tipping point I was completely snagged and had to stay up far later than was wise because I needed to know where we were going.

The author does a fine job taking the familiar, Twilight Zone type premise and giving it a great twirl. Pines is extremely engaging. It comes as absolutely no surprise that Fox has adapted the novel into a 10-part series to air in 2015. http://www.fox.com/wayward-pines/

Highly recommended. Time to start book two…

[schema type=”book” url=”http://www.blakecrouch.com/” name=”Pines” description=”Secret service agent Ethan Burke arrives in Wayward Pines, Idaho, with a clear mission: locate and recover two federal agents who went missing in the bucolic town one month earlier. But within minutes of his arrival, Ethan is involved in a violent accident. He comes to in a hospital, with no ID, no cell phone, and no briefcase. The medical staff seems friendly enough, but something feels…off. As the days pass, Ethan’s investigation into the disappearance of his colleagues turns up more questions than answers. Why can’t he get any phone calls through to his wife and son in the outside world? Why doesn’t anyone believe he is who he says he is? And what is the purpose of the electrified fences surrounding the town? Are they meant to keep the residents in? Or something else out? Each step closer to the truth takes Ethan further from the world he thought he knew, from the man he thought he was, until he must face a horrifying fact—he may never get out of Wayward Pines alive. Intense and gripping, Pines is another masterful thriller from the mind of bestselling novelist Blake Crouch.” author=”Blake Crouch” publisher=”Thomas & Mercer” pubdate=”2012-08-21″ isbn=”1612183956″ ebook=”yes” paperback=”yes” ]

Red Shirts by John Scalzi

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

You don’t need to be a Trekkie to be familiar with the “redshirt” phenomenon. During the three-year run of the original Star Trek tv series in the 1960’s, fans noticed a certain trend of crew members being briefly introduced and rapidly killed in bizarre ways whenever landing on some new planet. Whenever the anonymous characters beamed down with one or more of the main characters, you could practically hear the last grains of sand passing through their hourglasses. The writers seemed to have a passion for wiping out the crew around Kirk, Spock & Bones at a dramatic rate just to illustrate how perilous the missions were. In all, fans calculated that some 75% of the characters killed on the show were wearing red shirts, which is to say nothing of the other nameless crew members whose shirt color didn’t prevent them from suffering the same fate.

John Scalzi’s Hugo Award winning novel Redshirts sends up this phenomenon in an amusing fashion, following a fresh new recruit, Ensign Andrew Dahl, who has just arrived on the flagship Enterp-sorry, Intrepid. A number of other new faces have been assigned to the Intrepid, which needs all the bodies it can get, since the ship keeps losing people on every away mission the crew undertake. Along with his fellow recruits, Dahl begins to recognize that anyone selected to participate in an away mission had better not start any long books. In fact, any team members on a mission with certain Senior Officers are dead crewmen walking, and together the recruits begin to look for a way to stop this trend. After all, each of them has a backstory, but only barely, leading them to wonder if they are even the protagonist in their own story, or merely extras…

It’s a clever story, helped markedly by being a quick, well-paced read. The novel obviously works best if you are an avid Star Trek fan, but it isn’t reliant on the fact. I know the films and the original series pretty well, but am by no means a big Trek fan. A decent familiarity with sci-fi in general is adequate for most of the jokes here. I caught some great little tips of the hat and missed probably many more – it doesn’t matter – the story works mainly because it is not a spoof, but a very solid story that is funny on its own merits.

The dialogue is top shelf, which I have come to expect from Scalzi and the action is well written. The whole thing is breezily read and it all too easy to visualize as a living, breathing show. (I understand plans for a series are afoot.)

The book is advertised as “a novel with three codas” and these codas are really quite interesting. I have no intention of spoiling the story by explaining the inclusion of this “extra” material, but I they are very welcome additions and help to tie up the whole story.

Highly recommended.

[schema type=”book” url=”http://whatever.scalzi.com/” name=”Redshirts” description=”Ensign Andrew Dahl has just been assigned to the Universal Union Capital Ship Intrepid, flagship of the Universal Union since the year 2456. It’s a prestige posting, and Andrew is thrilled all the more to be assigned to the ship’s Xenobiology laboratory. Life couldn’t be better…until Andrew begins to pick up on the fact that (1) every Away Mission involves some kind of lethal confrontation with alien forces, (2) the ship’s captain, its chief science officer, and the handsome Lieutenant Kerensky always survive these confrontations, and (3) at least one low-ranked crew member is, sadly, always killed. Not surprisingly, a great deal of energy below decks is expendedon avoiding, at all costs, being assigned to an Away Mission. Then Andrew stumbles on information that completely transforms his and his colleagues’ understanding of what the starship Intrepid really is…and offers them a crazy, high-risk chance to save their own lives. Redshirts is the winner of the 2013 Hugo Award for Best Novel.” author=”John Scalzi” publisher=”Tor Books” pubdate=”2012-01-01″ isbn=”0765316994″ ebook=”yes” paperback=”yes” hardcover=”yes” ]

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Read this 100% because it was so heavily recommended by my wife. Granted, she recommends a lot of books to me, but this time she had me at “it’s a quick read and I still have it out of the library for a few days”. Does she ever know me…

It’s a grabber. I was snagged within a page and a half. I can see why so many people fall so hard for this book and this author. What an amazing way with words he has.

I absolutely fell in love with the main character, Hazel. So well written, so interesting. I can certainly understand why some may feel that the dialogue is not realistic for teenagers, but I disagree. Certainly not all teens are so introspective and literate, but based on my experience, I’d suggest probably a lot more are than you may expect.

The novel in unflinching in its depiction of the harsh realities of living with terminal illness, and the refreshing honesty of the writing makes this a wonderful read.

The heady first third of the novel is filled with the kind of exhilarating relationship creation that you just love to read – and is sadly unsustainable. One of these days we’ll come up with a novel that is made up of the exciting first acts of other books.

While the luster may wear off a bit, the novel continues to be interesting and moving throughout. It really is a wonderful book. It is definitely a heartbreaker, but I never felt as though it was a manipulative tearjerker. It’s a sad tale, but the author’s great writing delivers it without mawkish sentimentality.

Highly recommended.