2011, a look back

Here are the books I have read in 2011:

Mentor

Ancestor

The List

Survivor

Post Office

Teacher Man

Dear American Airlines

Last Known Victim

Blaze

Peter & The Starcatchers

Fanboy & Goth Girl

Mile 81

In Cold Blood

The House of Thunder

Your Heart Belongs to Me

Rage

The Good Guy

The Man who loved Books too Much

Lemons Never Lie

In The Night Room

Ham on Rye

That's Not in My American History Book

Afraid

Sh*t My Dad Says

Playing for Pizza

Be the Monkey - a dialog between Barry Eisler and JA Konrath

It's Always Something

2030

Other Kingdoms

Danse Macabre

This Book is Overdue

The Elephant went to Hollywood

Blockade Billy

My Lucky life in and out of Show Buisness

Squirrel seeks Chipmunk

Official Book Club Selection

The Island of Dr. Moruea

Playing for Keeps

The Day After

Sunken Treasure

Heaven is For Real

The Professor and The Mad Man

Unkillable

Musciophilia

The Storyteller

Cell

The Colorado Kid

A Million Little Pieces

Ernest Hemingway: A Writer's Life

Always Looking Up

I Like You

The Last Lecture

Stories I told Myself

The Bride Collector

Dress your Family in Corduroy and Denim

The Time of My Life

Wishful Drinking

Naked

Born Standing up

Dreams From My Father

My Reading Life

The Audacity of Hope

Scratch Beginings

Handle With Care

The Doomsday Club

My Boring-Ass Life

The Tenth Justice

The Girl who Played With Fire

Son of Groucho

The Last Bookstore in America

Origin

How to tell a story and other Essays

Darkness Under The Sun

Truck Stop

UR

Brian's Hunt

Brian's Return

What I'll be up to in 2012:

In the year ahead I plan on writing more short stories and novellas. I usually plan a book a year but hopefully will get the ball rolling on some stand alone stuff.

Hope everyone has a very happy new year!

“Isn't it nice to think that tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes in it yet?”

— L.M. Montgomery

Black Books

So I'm on my vacation from work. Usually on my vacations I tend to veg out, gorge on a little sleep, do a little writing, catch up on tv shows.

And one show, I'm delighted to say, has caught my attention. It's called Black Books. It stars Dylan Moran, Simon Peg's nemesis in Shaun of the Dead and also his fitness motivator in Run, Fatboy, Run. With him is a long haired sidekick who embodies a weirdo Curly sensibility and a short haired woman on the lookout for Mr. Right or even Mr. Right-now-will-have-to-do. This British comedy series is unlike anything I have seen so far. It takes place in a small bookshop where Bernard Black, the owner, is much like a tyrant to his customers. He hates life, traffic, idiots, skinheads, books, customers and people. People are the worst for him. Not only that but he gives off the air like he's always recovering from a bender. His turns of phrase and one-liners are the best, often producing stomach aches of laughter from both me and my wife.

The show ran from 2000 to 2004 and only has 18 episodes. Which is kind of tragic when you think about it that there are so few episodes but, I guess, when you nail it down, it was better that they quit on a strong note. The show is driven largely by his friends, Manny and Fran, who try to get Bernard to be more sociable as he is kind of a stick in the mud.

The antics are endless. Sometimes he pays the customers to take certain books out of the shop. He invents a wine bottle lollipop. He often finds himself in situations that get him into a bit of trouble. With a screwball comedy like this, I love the duality. While Bernard is surrounded and sometimes confounded by books, his friend, Manny, loves them. Manny often recommends books, handles book orders, does the accounting, opens up shop, and yet he and Bernard are complete opposites from each other. It's funny to think that this whole show came about because of a Little Book of Calm.

That's another thing. The fake book titles are hysterical. With titles such as The History of Screaming, Blue Sands and Tempopocalypse, how could this bookstore not thrive?

Now that I know about this one, I might just check out Spaced, which is considered the sister show to this one and done by the same guys, starring Simon Peg.

Don't believe that a show could be this funny? Well take a gander at the first episode below. I was smitten with the first three minutes.