BOOKS IN REVIEW
I’d like to first say that even though it’s now February,
I’m still thinking about what a great year 2016 was and all the amazing films,
live events, and books I read that helped make the year better than 2015. At the beginning of 2016 I told myself I was
going to read more books than in 2015 because as a writer I should be reading
more fiction and non-fiction to be able to craft more well-rounded and
compelling stories. Although I didn’t
fulfill my overall goal of the year, I did manage to read a good amount of
non-fiction books which in my opinion is always a good thing.
Of the fiction books I read I managed to finish “The
Meowmorphosis” from Franz Kafka and Coleridge Cook which is a mash-up take of
the Kafka classic except the main character morphs into a giant cute kitten
instead of a cockroach. Being a huge fan
of Kafka’s story I enjoyed the novelty of the book but to me giant cute kittens
are just as terrifying as cockroaches. I
also managed to read my first Elmore Leonard novel with “Raylan”, which is a
sequel to the show Justified (based on Leonard’s series of novels). I loved this novel so much that I plan on
going back to read more Leonard novels because he has a great style as an
author. I was completely disappointed
with John Shirley’s novelization of “Resident Evil: Retribution.” I’ve read all the books based on the films
and this is the worst of the lot; it took me a while to get through the book
because of the style of writing which wasn’t on par with any of the previous
novelizations. I’m hoping that the
novelization of “The Final Chapter” is much better.
I will say that a majority of the non-fiction books I read
this year were film related. I started
the year off with another book on director David Cronenberg (if you remember I
read two in 2015); “Cronenberg on Cronenberg” which is edited by Chris Rodley
was an excellent book on the insight of the infamous director of Scanners, The
Brood, The Fly, Dead Ringers, and countless others and getting into his process
of crafting these films was key to the books success. Now this isn’t a new book but because the
process of crafting these films isn’t going to change reading this book was
instrumental into getting into his head.
I would love to read an updated version of the book where the director
discusses his more current films. Along
these same lines is “Lucio Fulci: Poetry & Cruelty in the Movies” by
Antonio Bruschini & Antonion Tentori.
Not the best book on the infamous director as it spends more time on
synopsis of the films rather than on any meaningful discussion of the films
themselves but it works for those with a cursory knowledge of the director and
his films. Not really for those of us
who have read many of the other books dedicated to the director. Another film related book that I managed to
finish was actor Gunnar Hansen’s “Chainsaw Confidential: How We Made the
World’s Most Notorious Horror Movie” which details the making of the original
Texas Chain Saw Massacre for the perspective of the man that played
Leatherface. This was another great book
as it really got into the heart of what it felt like to be on the set of this
infamous film from beginning to end.
Hansen has a clear and concise way of presenting his story that is
engaging and entertaining at the same time.
It is said to say that this was his final book before passing away in
2015. Life Books also put out the
excellent “Life: Science Fiction: 100 Years of Great Movies” which every film
fan should make sure to pick up in order to put together their own list of
“must see” films.
A couple random books that I finished reading this year
include Inazo Nitobe’s “Code of the Samurai: Bushido: The Soul of Japan” which
is more of a coffee table book about everything as it relates to Bushido and
“30-Second Religion” edited by Russell Re Manning. I’ve been reading several of the books in the
“30-Second” series and they are a quick and informative reference guide to all
sorts of useful and helpful subjects.
I’m currently reading one of Ancient Egypt and well tell you how it is
next year.
Imagine Publishing updated it’s “100 All-Time Greatest
Comics (Third Edition)” which for comic fans is a must read. I learned a lot a great many comics that are
now on my “must read” for 2017. As you
know I read a lot of graphic novels but even this list had tons of titles I
wasn’t even familiar with.
On the supernatural side of things, I read “An American
Haunting: The Bell Witch” edited by Brent Monahan and based on the true story
of the Bell Witch incident (which was recently made into the film An American
Haunting). This was the entire story of
the legend and even those who have watched the film will be able to know all
the real details of what allegedly happened.
Ending my 2016 reading list will be several books in the Rue
Morgue 
Magazine Library series. A couple
years ago Rue Morgue started putting out books in there Library series on many
different topics geared towards horror fans and fans of the magazine. I managed to get through five of them last
year – “Blood in Four Colors: A Graphic History of Horror Comics”, “Cryptic
Collectibles: A Concise Compendium of Creepy Keepsakes”, “Horror Movie Heroes”,
“Horrorwood North: The Extraordinary History & Art of Canadian Genre
Cinema”, and “Weird Stats & Morbid Facts.”
I could go into detail about each of these books but suffice it to say
that these are an excellent series of books from all different aspects of the
horror genre. All of them are well
written and put together and informative.
These are some great additions to any horror fans book shelf and since
they each contain hundreds of photos they are great to look at as well.
Now that I look forward to 2017, I still need to get off my
ass and read more fiction books and read more variety of non-fiction books
(because I read too many books on film) but that’s something I’ll have to work
on. I’ll let you know next year how it
goes.
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