Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour-Bookstore

There was lots of buzz in calligraphy class about Robin Sloan's "24 Hour Bookstore." Though not overly-impressed, I liked it. It was an easy read, a bit contrived, but still a good story. The font connection was a nice touch: Gerritszoon aka Aldus Manutius a famous typesetter from the Fifteenth Century. The stuff portraying politics at Google was also fun though somehow unconvincing.

A few titles recommended in the text (along with everything by Murakami and Gibson) include The Information and House of Leaves.


Wednesday, March 06, 2013

Cory Doctorow's Homeland


In the sequel to Little Brother, we find our hero amping up, politicking with a purpose. And with the same theme: things are bad and might well get worse. Marcus gets wise advise from his childhood friend Jolu, advice easily usable, harder to actualize but worth mastering:

"Jolu was right: I just neede to take a step in the direction I wanted to head and stay flexible enough to keep moving that way no matter what happened."

For all ages, the young, the still young, the once young-Doctorow informs, entertains, educates us and keeps us hungry for more. A prolofic writer, he makes every effort to satisfy the obsessive/compulsive reader. But my appetite is only whetted...can't wait for the next one. Doctorow twitted Down & Out Magic Kingdom might be due for a prequel. Bring it.

Saturday, March 02, 2013

Google search for "first line generator"

https://www.google.com/search?q=first+line+generator&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a