( @babycenter )
Babycenter.com posted my first article for them today. It recounts our issues with putting Ben in daycare. Give it a read.
Babycenter: Daycare Drama
Book Review: The Dog Stars by Peter Heller
( #thedogstars )
Post apocalyptic fiction is very trendy these days. The success of zombie fiction and movies, and all of those “after humanity” TV shows with the skyscrapers falling apart have really amped up people’s appetite for the end of days.
Author Peter Heller threw his hat into the “last of humanity” ring and crafted a very compelling story. In “The Dog Stars” humanity is hit with a very nasty plague/fever that wiped out civilization. There are a few survivors left, some infected with a variation of the virus that doesn’t kill them but leaves them very weak, defenseless, and permanently quarantined.
Heller’s story centers around Hig, a nice guy pretty much going through the motions and waiting for his own end. Hig has a neighbor/semi-friend named Bangley. Bangley is a hardass gun nut who protects their little compound from other survivors attempting to loot or take their land (which has access to clean water). Hig constantly questions Bangley’s loyalty and surmises he is only kept around because he can fly planes (and keep them operational). Hig also has a pet dog that he cares very deeply for and wonders if Bangley will kill if he gets out of line.
Even though there are dangers from looters, Hig is becoming bored with his relatively safe life. He continues to take risks by leaving the compound and flying further away from the base on scouting missions. He eventually comes up with a plan to fly to a far away airport where he once received a weak signal, but he won’t have enough gas to return (if he can’t refuel at the other airport). Most of the book is spent with Hig convincing himself to leave and the issues and people he encounters when he does.
Heller thankfully avoids the typical tropes of post apocalyptic fiction (“humanity got what it deserves”, “we learned nothing from our mistakes” bla bla bla). The story is very stripped down: “are you prepared to do the things you need to do to survive (no judgement)?” Hig struggles with having to shoot other survivors (even as they try to kill him) and he also has to argue with Bangley when he helps a colony of the surviving infected (who are helpless and unable to get supplies).
The simplicity of the book is accented by Hig’s fragmented thoughts. Heller hints that Hig was not untouched by the virus and has trouble thinking (his thoughts in writing are in little bursts), although it could be from being alone and the trauma of losing his loved ones. There is some drag in the middle of the story, but it picks up again. Ultimately, the book boils down to this question: when you survive an extinction level event, is there anything worth living for? Heller does a pretty good job exploring that idea and coming up with an answer.
Book Review: Warm Bodies by Isaac Marion
( #warmbodies )
Hollywood is full of clever bastards. The Walking Dead is an extremely popular television show and comic book. It is also Feburary and a few weeks away from Valentines Day. What is a crafty movie executive to do? A romantic zombie movie or a romzom of course. I have been bombarded by ads for “Warm Bodies” for a few months and then I happened to read that it was based on a book…
… and said book was said to be considerably darker and deeper than the romzom version. So I downloaded it.
Warm Bodies is a short and enjoyable novel. It took me a few hours to read it and I liked it. The book is an obvious riff on “Romeo and Juliet”. The zombie’s name is “R” and the lead female is “Julie”. Her dad is in charge of the human survivors and clearly would not approve of his daughter’s necrophilia. Both characters have to buck their social norms to be together.
I suppose my only issue with the book is that the zombies have a society. If you see the commercial for the movie, you get the impression that “R” eating Julie’s boyfriend makes him start thinking and living again. The book also pushes this idea, but the zombies are clearly organized before “R’s” encounter with Julie. The zombies can sort of talk and there is a hierarchy to their society. They have strategy to eat humans. So they are not the typical zombies from the movies even before the main plot thread starts to happen.
The book tries to make “R” the zombie messiah and a romantic lead and those two thread compete for room in the book, but since this isn’t “War and Peace” you get over that problem pretty quickly. One thing I really appreciated about Marion’s writing is that he did not use the same terrible cliched words that every zombie writer uses – gore, guts, meat, disemboweled, and of course braaaaaiiins.
Bottom line: Fun and quick read – I recommend it.
DME: Barr Hill Gin Interview
( @drinkingmadeasy )
Drinking Made Easy just published my interview with Caledonia Spirits owner Todd Hardie. I am really happy with the way the interview and article turned out. Check it out via the link below! Leave some comments in the article too.
New Gig: Babycenter.com
I just found out today that I won the babycenter.com “Dad Blogger” contest. What does this mean? I get to write a dad-related blog each week which will be published on BabyCenter’s website. I am already thinking up some ideas. Until my first post, here is the content that earned me a victory.
PS: Big thanks to my friends and family. I know they came out in droves to vote and support me. I am very touched.
[Welcome to the Age of Worry]
I recall the moment my wife told me she was with child. She dimmed the lights throughout our home and placed candles on each step leading me to the bathroom and the positive test result.
We embraced each other for what seemed like hours and wept with joy knowing we had created life…
…I am totally lying! I don’t remember how or when my wife told me she was pregnant. Hell, I don’t remember getting her pregnant, but I do remember that the worry started when we found out she was pregnant.
Click the link to read the entire article over at Babycenter:
Link: http://blogs.babycenter.com/mom_stories/guess-what-dads-worry-just-as-much-as-moms/
Book Review: The Twelve by Justin Cronin
( #thetwelve @jccronin )
“The Twelve” is a sequel to Justin Cronin’s “The Passage” which I read a few years ago. I liked Cronin’s take on a vampire apocalypse. Cronin opted out of the typical gore-fest that seems to be a natural reaction to the “Twilight Vampires” (aka kind of wimpy) by telling a cause and effect story. The book is told in two timelines: how society falls and then 100 years into the future as society attempts to rebuild.
The Twelve continues the storyline in the future and but also revisits the initial outbreak to introduces a few new characters. Overall, I liked the book. But my enjoyment relied heavily on my enjoyment of the first book. The first section (revisiting the outbreak) is like a prequel with different characters (their viewpoint of what went down). While I liked how the outbreak was fleshed out, those chapters were not critical plot points. I am going to bring up some spoilers about the plot in this review, so this may be a good time to stop reading if you don’t want to know too much about the story.
**SPOILERS**
The prequel characters establish the bloodlines of the future characters which added depth, but like I said, not critical. The prequel chapters also establish the concept of a “familiar”. Every vampire can make a helper that has some powers and needs to drink blood, but they don’t change into monsters.
The main story is that one of the helpers, who is a fairly sympathetic character, is used to create a city/society of immortals that capture and enslave the remaining humans and of course feed them to the vampire overlords. This totally makes sense except for one thing…
There are twelve vampire leaders (hence the twelve) and the millions of vampires running around are basically mindless zombies controlled by one of the twelve. If you kill one of the twelve, all of the vampires in their bloodline die. A major part of the book is the twelve are moving to this vampire city to feed in comfort. But the city has been in progress FOR DECADES. Slaves are being fed to the zombie vampires for no real reason. At one point, The Twelve kill off most of their zombies because there are too many vampires hunting the remaining humans. Why feed the slaves to the mindless zombie vampires?
The “familiars” go through all this trouble to capture and enslave humans only to happily feed them to the mindless zombies. This would make sense if this was occurring with the twelve, but they don’t show up until much later in the book.
Also, most of the twelve head vampires are not fleshed out. Cronin spend most of the first book on a vampire named “Babcock” and singles out two vampires called “Martinez” and “Carter” in the second, but the others are just in the background. Why not just make 6 lead vampires?
**END SPOILERS**
Even with those illogical plot points, The Twelve is an entertaining and well written novel. Cronin is very good at giving the book a sense of history and handles the time shifts well. The book does suffer from middle child syndrome, but Cronin does a nice job setting up the third book. It is clear that the trilogy has a “big bad” and he was saved for the third book which should deliver a satisfying conclusion.
