Novel Eye

So, I've been having a dystopia fest (this is not rare for me--I am fascinated by dystopian literature). I read Margaret Atwood's "Madadam," another book in the series that began with "Oryx & Crake." If you haven't read "Oryx & Crake," I can't recommend it highly enough. It just blew my mind when I read it several years ago. It is both dystopian--pre-apocolyptic, and post-apocalyptic. And watched "Metropolis," and "Things to Come." Then I consumed "The Hunger Games"--all three books--in three days. I had never read "The Hunger Games" before, and I found the writing hard to slog through. I understand that it was supposed to capture the simple, plain speech of Katniss, along with the present tense, but 1st person, present tense is a hard sell for a long book, let alone three. That said, the story was intriguing. I will be curious to see how they handle the horrifying violence of the l...

What Was That Now?  Episode 3 Loann and Art discuss more summer movies, including Pacific Rim and the disastrous box office performance of The Lone Ranger. And we look at the emerging success of Netflix Original Series, such as House of Cards, Hemlock Grove, Arrested Development and the brand new Orange is the New Black.

Someone on the train was listening to “Bohemian Rhapsody” today. I could hear it, thin and tinny, from their headphones. I don’t know how people can do that, listen to music so loud. Or perhaps, their headphones are simply cheap and bleed the sound. I’m feeling my age I suppose, but I’ve never been able to listen to music at high volume. I have fantastic earbuds at the moment. When I put them in, I can barely hear anything else. In some ways that’s what you want, but in others it’s almost disturbing. Am I missing announcements? People asking me to move aside? Telling me that there’s a stampeding rhino heading my way? A couple of weeks ago I could hear the music from the woman next to me. Hear it well enough to recognize the songs: Whitney Houston chirpily singing, ‘How Will I Know?’ followed by Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean.” A playlist of dead people. Would Nirvana be next, or INXS? Joy Division? Or, like today, Queen? Someone newer, Amy Winehouse? I suppose if you ...

WWTNPodcast: Episode #2 Summer Movies, A Horror Master Passes O... : In this week's episode, Art and Loann discuss the passing of horror writer Richard Matheson and how an artist deals with critics and fa...

One Month After Newtown Shooting, NRA Releases Shooting Game App With Coffin-Shaped Targets : pWhen 20 children and 6 adults were gunned down in Sandy Hook Elementary School exactly one month ago today, the National Rifle Association rushed to blame video games, not guns, for inspiring such mass murders. But the gun lobby seemingly lost sight of its target in the past weeks, and over the weekend released a [...]/p