Swag, published in 1976 by Delacorte Press, begins the modern version of Leonard's bibliography. Before now, he'd written westerns and a few crime novels (I've been reading them the last few years). Swag has the same dark story of criminals doing crime and the police trying to catch them, but adds in a ton more levity and fun to the criminal acts. It's a fast read at around 225-250 pages depending on the edition, but it may take longer as everyone around you will ask what you are laughing at.
The library newsletter includes movie and book recommendations, upcoming children’s and reference events, and calls for revolution!
I've made it a personal mission to never meet my heroes. The few times I have have been awkward as hell, from musicians to artists to comedians except the very rare times I never realized who I was talking to. In Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, a filmmaker gets to meet their hero and it goes pretty well, all things considered.
By the time Barney the dinosaur rose to prominence, I was well into lighting fires in the back yard and wondering why Kelly Jo Cochrane looked so good in her bathing suit. The dancing purple love machine was more the target of playground mocking than anything of substance. Buddy targets that mocking and asks the question "what if that mascot was a petty elder god bent on selfish destruction?"
credit: Universal Pictures
I went to the theater and paid good money to watch people fall in love and, dammit, that's what I got. Finding Emily is a generic title for a right down the middle romcom in the style of She's All That if it was mixed with Nick and Nora's Infinite Playlist with a strange dash of PCU. Charming, funny, and overall a fun watch.
n this installment in the cornfield stalking murder clown series, our heroes Jerri, Cole, and Rust are putting on a movie about the tragic events of the first book. The one where all their friends died. Series protagonist Quinn is absent, presumed dead, so we add in Sabrina as the actress attempting to embody Quinn on screen and later during the murder spree. Add in the movie's cast of clown-food it's all Murder! Corn! and Action! as trauma and healing meet chainsaws and flamethrowers.
Credit: Marvel comics
Fall is approaching! Children are getting back in their forced labor camps, the squirrels are digging up the yard, and the leaves are waiting to fall off the trees, turn brown, and decay into the soil. It is a time for the end of thriving life and the slow decline into the heartbreak of frozen grief. May August end and September birth a new, colder hell.
A punk rock noir-themed attitude has been pushed through cinema the last decade or so, largely by the actions of the current evil empire and James Gun. Coyote vs Acme continues that community-minded, anti-authoritarian, anti-consumerist mindset. And it's damn funny.
Hell of a thing when people that mean so much are gone just days from one another.
Hell of a week getting back into the swing of things, let me tell you. Right away we went from rising with the sun in Italy and finding beautiful images to share to squinting into the sunrise and spotting a leaf and saying, "That'll do." Hope springs eternal that the relaxed mind can continue, but sometimes that shit just lives outside of your natural life.
Stop me if you heard this one. A group of folks go off into the woods and find themselves lost in an existential horror. There's no hobbits or Blair Witches though, just a Jeep Cherrokee and a bunch of screaming people running out of the trees. What the movie lacks in originality it makes up for in acting and directing cause otherwise it would have been boring as shit.
Hell yeah we're gonna start with a dysfunctional family at a block party. Then a laser light show minus Pink Floyd comes along and dumps the neighborhood into a better Jurassic World sequel than the ones we got. These dinosaurs came to chew Bubblegum and kick ass, and only one cat in the neighborhood was named Bubblegum.
Over the last week I have been traveling around Italy, from Rome to Milan and up a bit into Switzerland's Lake Lugano. My god how easy it is to get around and how helpful and well dressed everyone seems to be. Of course, this close to the Assumption of Mary, most everyone was taking a vacation. Rome and Milan especially were full of empty shops and closed shutters as everyone ran from the heat of the city.
Ah the time of the year when everyone is tired of the hot weather, the smoke is thick in the sky, and the children are beginning to get restless. They have been free for months and are comfortable with that freedom. Time to take it away and prepare them for the capitalist system they were born into.
It's refreshing to see a beefy man going through puberty on the big screen. I have not seen such a thing since Jeff Goldblum started spitting on his food in The Fly. At least ole Spider-Man has the comforting presence of a soldier with PTSD to help him fight off a teenage telepath and a green hurricane of violence. Truly a brand new day for everyone involved.
The library wishes to thank everyone who participated in Summer Reading this year. With only a few weeks until school starts, we ask that whoever stole the stapler bring it back and no questions will be asked.
The Count of Monte Cristo can suck a chrome bumper next to Motor City, the new near-silent movie from director Potsy Ponciroli about a man framed for a crime and fights tooth and nail to get his fiance back. It's all 70's style and music with Reacher star Alan Ritchson sporting several shaggy wigs before cutting down those locks to murder fools with shotgun shells full of loose change and an engagement ring. Hell hath no fury like a motherf**ker with nothing to lose.
A body face-down in a pool is cinematic language for "I've seen old movies, too." To open your movie that way and have your Norma Desmond bare ass is a bold statement, especially when you have no intention of paying that shit off.
Boat trip! Follow Odysseus and his crew of fuckwits as they wander around the Mediterranean for a bit meeting interesting people and dying in gruesome ways while back home a bunch of guys are eating Odysseus's food, trying to marry his wife, and plotting to kill his kid. This movie has everything including ear splitting rumbling sounds that will make you wonder "what did he say?"
The library swim team is gearing up for another relay this weekend. Join us as we charge across the river against teams from the Parks Department, Sanitation, and whatever happens in that big grey building downtown.