Thursday, March 06, 2008

Three Mysteries, Anne Rice, Arthritis Treatment, Killer's Wife

Mysteries

Dead Time by Stephen White. Colorado psychologist Alan's ex-wife Merideth comes to him for help in finding his ex-wife's missing surrogate mom. Alan finds a tie-in to a tragic Grand Canyon trip by Merideth's fiancee and "unearths a series of secrets and deceptions that someone wishes to keep buried at all costs."

Grounds for Murder by Sandra Balzo. Coffee in Milwaukee. A coffee trade show in Milwaukee features rivalries and clashing egos. Attendees really see red when coffee shop owner Maggy finds a body under her table.

Cruelest Month by Louise Penny. Third in a series featuring Chief Inspector Armand Gamache of the Quebec Provincial Police. Gamache is called to the small Quebec town of Three Pines to investigate a death during a seance. A well written "literary mystery" with neat characters and setting.

Fiction

Killer's Wife by Bill Floyd. Leigh has lived quietly with her son in North Carolina for six years. Things are fine until a still mourning father exposes Leigh's past as the wife of a serial killer whose testimony sealed her husband's death sentence. And now another serial killer is copying her husband's work and focusing on people from Leigh's past.

Christ the Lord: the road to Cana by Anne Rice. Anne Rice, huh? A vampire Jesus?

Large Print

Strangers in Death by Nora Roberts/J.D. Robb. Prominent businessman Thomas Anders dies by strangulation in bed in 2060 New York. A crime of passion or an execution?

Non Fiction

Too Young to Feel Old: the arthritis doctor's 28-day formula for pain-free living by Richard H. Blau, MD, F.A.C.R..

More Music

CDs

We Have You Surrounded by The Dirtbombs. Garage rock from Detroit. Playing in Madison in May.

Here My Dear by Marvin Gaye. Gaye's bizarre divorce album from 1978. Part of his divorce settlement included that he make an album and his wife would receive all proceeds. Gaye produced this "two-disc-long confessional on the deterioration of their marriage; starting from the opening notes of the title track, Gaye viciously cuts with every lyric deeper into an explanation of why the relationship died the way it did. Gaye uses the album, right down to its packaging, to exorcise his personal demons with subtle visual digs and less-than-subtle lyrical attacks."

Love is Simple by The Akron Family. I cannot recall why I ordered this. I think the band appeared on someone else's disc.

Lust, Lust, Lust by the Raveonettes. A duo from Copenhagen. "The sound of a band rescuing their career from the clutches of cliché and rediscovering the magic that made them so exciting on their debut."

Some People Have Real Problems by Sia. A singer with a lot of recent press. Listen.

Hernando by North Mississippi Allstars. Roots rock from Mississippi. Another band with recent press. Listen.

Bunch of DVDs

DVD

Wild Women of Wongo starring Jean Hawkshaw, Johnny Walsh. The classic 1959 picture. The Wongo women reject their brutish men when the handsome Prince of Goona proposes the two tribes unite to fight off the Tribe of Ape Men.
Here is the story on this one. I originally ordered the 2007 picture The Film Crew: Wild Women of Wongo produced by the creators and writers of Mystery Science Theatre 3000 with voice over comments ridiculing the original 1959 picture. We could not find a catalog record for Film Crew and sent it over to West Bend to have it cataloged. But, the notes attached to that DVD were lost and the staff there assumed the item was a donation. Since the selectors at West Bend decided not to add the "donation" they put it in their book sale and some lucky duck bought it and took it home.
Since the staff at West Bend erred, Director Michael offered to buy a replacement. I sent Mike the information for Film Crew but whoever ordered the replacement bought the original 1959 version. Since the original seems so wonderfully awful I'm just going to keep it.

30 Days of Night starring Josh Hartnett and Melissa George. Vampires visit an Alaskan town in winter while the sun is gone for 30 days.

Beowulf directed by Robert Zemeckis. Animated telling of Beowulf.

Iceman Interviews. A compilation of three HBO programs on Richard Kuklinski. Kuklinski was a paid killer from New Jersey convicted for murder. He was interviewed on camera by psychiatrist Dr. Park Dietz. Kuklinski was a scary guy.

In the Valley of Elah starring Tommy Lee Jones and Charlize Theron. Soldier Mike Deerfield's father Hank goes searching for Mike after Mike disappears on his return from Iraq.

Rescue Dawn starring Christian Bale and Steve Zahn, directed by Werner Herzog. Gustavus drop-out Zahn plays a fellow POW of Dieter Dengler. Both men plan escape from a Vietnamese POW prison camp.
Watch Herzog's documentary Little Dieter Learns to Fly to learn more about Dengler and his escape.

Chalk starring some dudes. Fake documentary style comedy about a struggling first year teacher and his colleagues. I read a good review in the Madison paper when this was in the theater.

Torchwood: the complete first season. A spin-off of the the latest Dr. Who. My wife was lobbying for me to buy this.

Land of the Dead starring John Leguizamo, Simon Baker, Dennis Hopper. A zombie movie? At the Lake Mills Library? Unthinkable! The latest entry in George A. Romero's zombie tale.

Sea Change starring Tom Selleck, Kathy Baker, Rebecca Pidgeon, Sean Young, William Sadler. The fourth entry in Selleck's dramatizations of Robert B. Parker's Jesse Stone mystery series. These have been good movies.

Things We Lost in the Fire starring Halle Berry and Benicio Del Toro. Audrey's loving husband dies in a fire leaving her and her children adrift. Audrey invites her husband's longtime pal Jerry to stay with the family and they "discover hope and happiness in their new lives."

Into the Wild starring Emile Hirsch, Hal Holbrook. Young man travels across U.S. and into Alaska and dies in the wilderness.