Alrightreads: Firsts

Jean "Moebius" Giraud, Jean-Paul Appel-Guery and Paula Salomon, Mœbius 1: Upon a Star

1983-87 (collected 1987) / Ecomic / 72 pages / France

***

The selective reprint retrospective doesn't run chronologically, instead choosing to lead with the free-reign corporate commission that produced the strangest car advert in history. The introductions explaining his creative process really skirt around the drugs.

Faves: 'The Repairmen' & 'Upon a Star (A Citroën Cruise).'

Sean French, The Terminator

1996 / Ebook / 72 pages / UK

****

A convincing defence of James Cameron's derivative feminist killer cyborg B-movie against snobs and people who haven't seen the film since before their lit crit senses were honed to delight in clumsy Biblical symbolism.

Warren Zanes, Dusty Springfield's Dusty in Memphis

2003 / Ebook / 121 pages / USA

**

It seemed a strange choice to kick off these tributes to classic hipster albums with an easy listening staple where someone sings other people's songs with the house band. But in prioritising the personal over the analytical, it's a good demonstration of this series' free-for-all mission statement, for better and worse.

Jacqueline Rubin, Naturally Healthy First Foods for Baby: The Best Nutrition for the First Year and Beyond

2008 / Ebook / 275 pages / USA

****

Good if obvious advice, handy reference tables and plenty of home recipes broken down by month if you have the patience and morals to make everything yourself and not rely on Nestlé.

James S. A. Corey, Leviathan Wakes

2011 / Audiobook / 577 pages / USA

***

Decent solar system building and distinctive characters to set up the series, but it mainly made me want to read some Firefly sequels instead.

Alrightreads: F

Isaac Asimov, Foundation

1942-51 (collected 1951) / Audiobook / 255 pages / USA

****

All of this has happened before, and all of this will happen again. A classic of space politics, though admittedly I prefer my feuding space empires to be differentiated by rubber forehead prosthetics and borderline racist parodies of historical cultures.

Arthur C. Clarke, The Fountains of Paradise

1979 / Audiobook / 256 pages / UK

****

Earlier in his career, Clarke would have presented his space lift proposition via a concise short story, subsequently padded out to a less engaging cash-in novel. Later on, he would have got someone else to write it for him. This is the sweet spot where the elder sci-fi statesman was taking the time to explore the technicalities of his idea in detail, blended with literary pomp to scoop all the awards.

Iain M. Banks, Feersum Endjinn

1994 / Audiobook / 279 pages / UK

****

Anyone like me who lamented the lack of off-putting experimental wank in Banks' mainstream novels after the '80s will find it alive and well in his sci-fi line. This was the first all-new one after he ran out of juvenile first drafts to rewrite, and after edging for so long, he earned the indulgent release. The Gothic megastructures and cheekily frustrating phonetic narration of the '80s are back, pushed to new extremes, updated with nostalgically '90s cyberpunk. Easily my favourite of his sci-fi books (so far) and encouragement to keep going.

Andrew Hultkrans, Love's Forever Changes

2003 / Ebook / 127 pages / USA

***

The music barely gets a look-in in this paean to paranoid psychedelic prophet Arthur Lee. Probably best digested on the same aperitif you're pairing the album with, but be prepared for things to get heavy.

Nikki Stafford, Finding Lost: Season Six – The Unofficial Guide

2010 / Ebook / 319 pages / USA

****

Reliably in-depth recaps, observations and faux real-time postulations for any newcomers reading along as they watch, until everyone's up to speed and the rest of the book can be a compulsory defence of the polarising finale, which apparently disappointed some people who required hard science fiction explanations for everything that happened in their supernatural show. I was never so engaged with the final year generally, so this wasn't the nostalgic trip the other guides were.

Alrightreads: The Ends

Isaac Asimov, The End of Eternity

1955 / Audiobook / 191 pages / USA

*****

Not getting around to Asimov until embarrassingly late means I've still got a lot to look forward to. I'd always simplistically characterised him as the robot guy, I had no idea he'd written one of the all-time time travel classics. Just like when I first read Heinlein's time loop tales, it was a joy to find vintage sci-fi that's so up my mutable self-authoring space-time block universe.

David Wong, John Dies at the End

2001-05 (collected 2007) / Audiobook / 362 pages / USA

***

Supernatural detectives get the stoner–slacker treatment, with gore galore and pop culture tourettes. It's the sort of thing I'd be persuaded I loved at fifteen. Good title, anyway.

Carl Wilson, Celine Dion's Let's Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste

2007 / Ebook / 176 pages / Canada

****

For a series that prided itself on being open-minded and outside the box – occasionally featuring straight-up fiction between the in-depth reviews of canonical classics – the prospect of looking dorky was evidently too much and required a unique subtitle to explain what was going on, perfectly illustrating the treatise within. He's totally right, I've had it with tribal snobbery and people's 'objective' taste and don't read websites like those any more, including this one.

Petr Ludwig, The End of Procrastination: How to Stop Postponing and Live a Fulfilled Life

2013 / Ebook / 272 pages / Czech Republic

***

I think my procrastination's under control, but these scientifically-backed self-help tips are good to know. Now back to work, I guess.

Brian Greene, Until the End of Time: Mind, Matter, and Our Search for Meaning in an Evolving Universe

2020 / Audiobook / 448 pages / USA

***

I found Bri's books on string theory and parallel universes fascinating as they soared over my head, though his book concerning the entirety of everything was a bit much. This latest one covers everything again and more, which is just getting silly.

Alrightreads: Eights

Jean Michel Charlier and Jean "Moebius" Giraud, Mœbius 8: Mississippi River

1979-91 (collected 1991) / Ecomic / 64 pages / France

*

Scraping the gun barrel of Mœbius' Collected Fantasies, his art for a fellow Frenchman's boring American Civil War antiparable is unrecognisable in its realism and lack of zest. Too coy to even show blood, this must have looked really out of place amid the fantastic landscapes, tits and gore of other Heavy Metal strips.

Benjamin M. Korstvedt, Bruckner: Symphony No. 8

2000 / Ebook / 148 pages / USA

**

The case for this unappreciated composer's unpopular, technically unplayable symphony actually being good seems to hinge solely on it being clever. That's enough to convince me sometimes, admittedly, but I didn't care for it.

Peter Godfrey-Smith, Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness

2016 / Audiobook / 257 pages / Australia

***

Presents the evidence that octopuses and their invertebrate brethren are smart and have feelings as if that's a shocking game changer. Arbitrary cut-off points for empathy are bizarre.

Robert Kurson, Rocket Men: The Daring Odyssey of Apollo 8 and the Astronauts Who Made Man's First Journey to the Moon

2018 / Audiobook / 384 pages / USA

****

Oral history as omniscient narrative, this is an immersive account of a voyage that would be more legendary if the sequel hadn't stolen its thunder.

Nancy Atkinson, Eight Years to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Missions

2019 / Ebook / 240 pages / USA

***

There are enough books about the moon landing, so this one gives a more balanced overview of the journey to the small step and at least a few of the 400,000 other people who contributed. As such, it's pretty boring and technical for the first half until we get to the tragedy and triumph.

Alrightreads: Elements

Arthur C. Clarke, Earthlight

1955 / Audiobook / 222 pages / UK

***

I liked the short story a lot when I read all of those. This extended version must have added a lot by definition, but it didn't add anything to the experience. By taking so much longer to cover the same ground, it's easily the weaker version. Come on, you could fit loads of stories into that binding.

J. G. Ballard, The Wind from Nowhere

1961 / Ebook / 160 pages / UK

***

The odd one out in Ballard's ecogeddon tetralogy, it feels as if he needed to get the Hollywood disaster movie out of his system, complete with screenplay-ready beats and stock characters, before he could start getting weird and constructing pyramids to inaugurate Hodgson's Night Land.

J. G. Ballard, The Drowned World

1962 / Audiobook / 158 pages / UK

****

We skip well past the thrilling disaster movie this time to follow some jaded explorers seeking meaning in London's tropical lagoon, when they're not killing each other or fighting crocodiles. Discussions of evolutionary pseudobiology and ancestral memory in this setting seemingly wasn't trippy enough for the author, he had to write The Crystal World to remedy that.

J. G. Ballard, The Burning World (a.k.a. The Drought)

1964 / Audiobook / 160 pages / UK

***

Reading Ballard's increasingly sadistic apocalypse porn back to back made the abruptly parched Earth even more affecting. His characters grow more believable with each one, which makes it even harder to disconnect. There's always a glimmer of hope at the end, at least. He's not a monster.

Steve Aylett, Heart of the Original: Originality, Creativity, Individuality

2015 / Ebook / 133 pages / UK

**

Less a manifesto than an excuse for a joke book of one liners and a chance to vent about overrated authors. Speaking of which, it's all been downhill from Lint.

Alrightreads: E

Iain M. Banks, Excession

1996 / Audiobook / 451 pages / UK

***

I'd forgotten how dense and confounding the Culture books could be, and jumping back in half-way after a few years' absence, this chaotic scramble wasn't the smoothest return. But I love me an ancient geometric space enigma, so I had to deal with the alienation, tinged with the customary sadism.

Julian Rushton, Elgar: Enigma Variations

1999 / Ebook / 128 pages / UK

****

Half forensic analysis of the musical portraits, half conspiracy theorist dot-connecting and album syncing in a futile bid to finally crack the (possibly non-existent) Elgar Code on its centennial. That Nimrod sounds like a swell guy.

Kevin J. H. Dettmar, Gang of Four's Entertainment!

2014 / Ebook / 160 pages / USA

***

A meandering mixtape of memories and erudite digressions that makes a good stab at untangling the borderline-incomprehensible debut from the Leeds-based neo-Marxist-Situationist post-punks.

Gina Arnold, Liz Phair's Exile in Guyville

2014 / Ebook / 136 pages / USA

**

It's a shame this wasn't treated as a first draft to get the exhausted fan solidarity out of her system so she could write appreciatively about the album rather than spending most of the short book defending it against attitudes I didn't have. It was briefly promising when it got into direct parallels with the Rolling Stones album, but then that dredged up more negativity.

Ann Handley, Everybody Writes: Your Go-To Guide to Creating Ridiculously Good Content

2014 / Ebook / 301 pages / USA

*****

This is the best writing guide I've read, comprehensively summarising the most important grammar rules and readability tips with plenty of practical examples specific to marketers, for a change. Some of the SEO/social specifics will gradually lose their relevance each year without a new edition every once in a while, but you can double check those. A bigger problem is that its generalised title gives no indication it's a Content Marketing Bible, otherwise I could've read it years ago and saved a lot of time.

Robinson Crusoe: A Haven of Inaccurate Facts – 20th Anniversary Illustrated Edition

It's been 20 years since I sat at the family PC, bashing out a stream-of-consciousness critical commentary in real time, for some reason, as my youngest brother watched the video of Animafilm's 1973 adaptation of Robinson Crusoe, for some reason. Little did the angsty teenage critic know he was creating his own "stupid" and "pathetic" historical relic to be mocked in due course.

Fortunately, I didn't put it on the internet... until now, in a special illustrated edition that might help those unfamiliar with the cartoon (there must be some people) to understand where 14-year-old, casually homophobic me was coming from. Sadly, this involved breaking up the original WALL OF TEXT into more legible paragraphs, which spoils the effect somewhat.

Added emphasis and [footnotes] when 34-year-old, slightly less homophobic me felt the need to chime in. If you're watching along, I only made it as far as 25:40 (out of 1:14:30) before getting bored. If you can't be bothered to read the whole thing, ctrl+F for 'gay' and 'thick' to get the gist.

Alrightreads: Driving

Iain Sinclair, Crash

1999 / Ebook / 112 pages / UK

****

I haven't read Ballard's novel to rate it against Cronenberg's damaged film (curiously unarousing even at thirteen), but when the academic write-up has more artistry than the selected quotes, Sinclair's Crash wins. I hope the BFI made a habit of hiring proper writers to bang on about films they like, they're on to a winner.

Geoff Andrew, 10

2005 / Ebook / 88 pages / UK

***

It's always good to go into films blind, but when the background is clearly more interesting than the content, to the point of distraction, you're better off skipping to the "what I was doing there..." and appreciating retrospectively on principle so you don't have to actually sit through the thing.

James Sallis, Drive

2005 / Audiobook / 158 pages / USA

****

Aspirational lifestyle drama in the throbbing vein of American Psycho. High-octane neon noir thrills all the way, until it slows down at the end and reality catches up to spoil the fun.

James Sallis, Driven

2012 / Audiobook / 147 pages / USA

***

Drive leaves you wanting more by design, so I carried on to the customarily unnecessary sequel. Older, slower and paranoid, I enjoyed the change of pace. More reckless thrills would have been boring.

Mark Polizzotti, Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited

2006 / Audiobook / 161 pages / USA

***

Biographical background and speculations about a bunch of songs. It's not something you really need a guide to help you appreciate, but they even have ones for Andrew W.K. and New Kids on the Block, so it'd be weird to skip him.

Ranking the Dream Theater albums

Dream Theater's an interesting band. Not always good, but interesting. And not always interesting.

It Is My The Top 15 Dream Theater Official Studio Albums and E.P. Don't agree? Don't worry. It couldn't matter less.

Alrightreads: More Dead Stuff

Harry Harrison, Deathworld

1960 / Audiobook / 154 pages / USA

***

It's no Dune, but this action-packed survival story in a superlatively harsh setting would've made a fun watered-down Saturday morning cartoon.

Michael Crichton, Eaters of the Dead: The Manuscript of Ibn Fadlan Relating His Experiences with the Northmen in AD 922

1976 / Audiobook / 288 pages / USA

***

I liked the faux scholary commentary and the historical melting pot, but the plot wasn't any more interesting than an authentic saga would have been, without the anthropological value.

Joe Pernice, The Smiths' Meat is Murder

2003 / Audiobook / 102 pages / USA

*

I never got into this particular Smiths album, for whatever reason, so hoped this appraisal might help me to remember and appreciate it. Unfortunately, the writer fancied himself a wild card and wrote an irrelevant fictional novella that gave him an excuse to perv over Lolitas instead. A waste of time, but at least not too much time.

Donnie Eichar, Dead Mountain: The Untold True Story of the Dyatlov Pass Incident

2013 / Audiobook / 288 pages / USA

**

The incredible story of a self-important American who went to the rescue when Russians failed to solve their own mystery for fifty years.

Jeff VanderMeer, Dead Astronauts

2019 / Audiobook / 352 pages / USA

****

This psychedelic post-sense future congeals into clarity as it goes along. Apparently the second book in a series, but I recommend diving in here for optimal disorientation, as well as averting your eyes from blurbs or reviews. Including this one, fuck off.