"No One Gets the Cupcake": A Review of Jay Martel's Channel Blue

Title: Channel Blue
Author: Jay Martel
Edition: Head of Zeus, Ltd. (Paperback, 2014)
Pages: 374
How I Came By This Book: Sadly, I no longer work in a library, but I still spend inordinate amounts of time in them. This book was found on the New Fiction shelf at my town library.

About the Author: I'm an executive producer and writer for "Key & Peele," a sketch show on Comedy Central. I've created various TV shows, written screenplays, gardened for Richard Nixon, and was once arrested for confronting Jeb Bush about Florida's death penalty program. I've also written comic pieces for "The New Yorker" and "Rolling Stone." Channel Blue is my first novel. For more info on Channel Blue and my writing, please check outfacebook.com/authorjaymartel. (from GoodReads)

Synopsis: Earth used to be Galaxy Entertainment's most lucrative show. The inhabitants of the Western Galaxy--the savviest, richest demographic in the Milky Way--just couldn't get enough of the day-to-day details of the average Earthling's life.

But now Channel Blue's ratings are flagging, and its producers are planning a spectacular finale. In just three weeks, their TV show will go out with a bang. The trouble is, so will Earth.

Only one man can save our planet from total destruction. And he's hardly a hero...

Review: Perry Bunt is a has-been screenwriter teaching screenwriting at a community college. He's broke, single, and bored, with only masturbation and the sight of his lovely student, Amanda Mundo, to break the monotony of everyday life. What he doesn't know is that he's about to become the most important person in the galaxy. Channel Blue is the story of an everyman thrust into an impossible position: he's the only sane person on Earth who knows that mankind is going to destroy itself in three weeks for the personal entertainment of trillions of viewers, which makes him the only one who can stop it from happening.

Unbeknownst to the 7 billion people on this planet, we're being watched. A lot. Our whole planet is Channel Blue, a conglomeration of thousands of television stations devoted to broadcasting the daily successes and foibles of humankind. Tuning in every second of the day is the rest of the galaxy, including the Edenites, an advanced form of human that has come to see entertainment as its highest priority. They delight in watching the "Earthles" fight wars, get gravely injured, or just all-around fail at life. And all of this has been happening without our knowledged. In fact, up until Perry Bunt stumbles into the wrong room in Galaxy Entertainment in an attempt to return Amanda Mundo's jacket to her, the only Earthle who knew about Channel Blue was a homeless man named Ralph, who hangs outside a convenience store. Unfortunately, for Perry, this one error in judgment will embroil him in a battle to save the world.

With ratings dropping, Galaxy Entertainment has decided to cut its losses and let Channel Blue go. In order to go out with a bang, the producers of Channel Blue put a series of events into motion--earthquakes, violence, a foiled airplane crash--that will eventually set off a spark in the Middle East, leading to all-out nuclear annihilation. When Perry discovers that this is the case, he sets out to save the planet by showing the galactic viewers that Earth isn't beyond saving. He becomes determined to prove that Earth isn't all violence and mindless stupidity, but his fellow Earthles don't make it easy for him. Every time he tries to do something nice, it backfires on him: he gets beat up; he inadvertently starts a religion; he gets locked up in a secret government facility and waterboarded.

As he and Amanda Mundo trip through these events together, their gaffes become a number one hit TV show: Bunt to the Rescue. The more popular the show gets, the crazier life gets for Perry, as the producers at Channel Blue up the stakes in order to up their ratings. In the middle of all of this chaos, Perry discovers a deep, dark secret that changes his view of the world forever. What will happen in the end? Will the Earth be saved? And will Perry survive to complete his mission?

Channel Blue is a hilarious comedy of errors in which the errors are not just Perry's--they're also our own. Martel satirizes humanity twice--we are both the watched and the watchers. He pokes fun at religion, politics, terrorism, nationalism. He takes swing after swing at our entertainment-obsessed, violent, and self-centered society. It's such a masterful piece of satire, with layer upon layer of scathing criticism veiled with non-stop laughter. The dual-criticism technique was new to me and it was extremely refreshing. In fact, it didn't quite click in my head that Martel is portraying us as the Earthles AND the Edenites until I sat down to write this review.

The plot is a bit twisty-turny, jerking the reader in a new direction every time it seems he or she has the novel figured out. It kept me guessing straight up to the end of the book, although occasionally I felt like I had whiplash from some of the more drastic plot twists. Martel doesn't make life easy for his poor protagonist, nor does he make it clear to the reader where things are headed. I definitely did not see the book going where it did when I started reading it, which is great. It's very rare that a book surprises me like that.

The characters are caught up in a whirlwind, which means that their development is very plot driven. Perry and Amanda are obviously the two main characters and therefore are the most developed. But there are several other characters to look out for, including Nick Pythagorus, Amanda's nine-year-old boss, and Noah Overton, Perry's bewildered neighbor, who only wants to make the world a better place. There's even a special guest star. I'll give you a hint: "Thank you. Thank you very much."

I really liked this book a lot. I would definitely recommend it if you're a fan of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy or social satire in general. I'm giving Channel Blue 4 out of 5 Gabriels.

-Gabe

Giving China the "Bird": A Review of Christopher Buckley's They Eat Puppies, Don't They?

Title: They Eat Puppies, Don't They?
Author: Christopher Buckley
Edition: Twelve (Hardcover, 2012)
Pages: 335
How I Came by This Book: The cover caught my eye when I saw it on the shelf at my library.

About the Author: Christopher Buckley is the author of fourteen books, among them Losing Mum and Pup: A Memoir and Thank You for Smoking, which was made into a movie in 2005. He first visited China in 1974 as a guest of the government. He did not eat any puppies, but, out of politeness to his hosts, managed to choke down numerous sea slugs, the memory of which still makes him shudder. A spontaneous attempt to present Chairman Mao with a jar of American peanut butter resulted in his nearly being gunned down by unamused palace guards. He lives in Connecticut with his wife, Katy, and yellow Labrador retriever, Jake, who no longer retrieves, preferring things to be brought to him.

Synopsis: In an attempt to gain congressional approval for a top-secret weapons system, Washington lobbyist "Bird" McIntyre teams up with sexy, outspoken neocon Angel Templeton to pit the American public against the Chinese. Then Bird fails to uncover an authentic reason to slander the nation, he and Angel put the Washington media machine to work, spreading a rumor that the Chinese secret service is working to assassinate the Dalai Lama.

Meanwhile in China, mild-mannered President Fa Mengyao and his devoted aide Gang are maneuvering desperately against sinister party hard-liners Minister Lo and General Han. Now Fa and Gang must convince the world that the People's Republic is not out to kill the Dalai Lama, while maintaining Fa's small margin of power in the increasingly militaristic environment of the party.

On the home front, Bird must contend with a high-strung wife who entertains Olympic equestrian ambition, and the qualifying competition happens to be taking place in China. As things unravel abroad, Bird and Angel's lie comes dangerously close to reality. And as their relationship rises to a new level, so do mounting tensions between the United States and China.

Review: I had read a different Buckley novel, Little Green Men, a while ago, before I even started this blog, and wasn't quite sure how to take it. I liked it, especially all the bits before what I considered to be a lackluster ending. The same goes here for Buckley's latest, They Eat Puppies, Don't They?

Bird McIntyre is an aspiring novelist and lobbyist trying to drum up anti-Chinese sentiment. When the Dalai Lama collapses in Rome, Bird gets an idea: make people think that the Chinese have attempted to assassinate him. Everyone loves the Dalai Lama, right? That'll be sure to make Americans hate the Chinese. Teaming up with single mom neocon Angel Templeton--with all the slick and sickening spin of Ann Coulter, just with more personality--he feeds lies about the Chinese to an Indian newspaper, setting off a series of events that could have devastating consequences. Satirical in nature (but too close to the truth about lobbyists and neocons for it to be laugh-out-loud funny), the novel pokes fun at the media, war hawks, the right, the left, and everything in between.

This is a novel about the rich and powerful and the mischief they get up to. There are a few characters--Bird's wife and the war hawks Lo and Han--that are obnoxious and need to be smacked upside the head, but the rest of the characters are actually pretty likeable. Bird is a little too incompetent to be believable as a highly-desired defense lobbyist, but he's likeable enough for the reader to overlook that. Angel is an absolute horror when it comes to what she believes, as well as her war-loving personality, but the bits with or about her son give her an interesting softness that is lacking in some portrayals of women in politics. The stand-out characters are actually Fa and Gang, the dove-ish Chinese leader and his faithful sidekick, and Bewks, Bird's Civil War-reenacting brother. These three are reason enough to read this book, especially for Fa and Gang's bathroom conversations (a necessity given that his house is bugged and the only way for them to talk is to keep water running in order to garble their words) and Bewk's brothers-in-arms coming to Bird's aid at the end of the novel.

A lot of this novel made me uncomfortable because of the racism and the disdain for others that a lot of the characters express. Angel and Lo are the biggest perpetrators of this, but there are a lot of conservative people saying a lot of horrible things. Yes, the novel is a satire, and yes this aspect of the novel is meant to caricature certain types of people, but I still couldn't help but shake my head every time someone said something ridiculous or offensive. There are far too many people in this country who hold racist beliefs and who will openly articulate them for me to find these caricatures funny. Knowing that Buckley is the son of National Review-founder William Buckley (and that he wrote for the publication for a while) makes me even more uneasy about it.

The novel goes pretty strong for a while. The plot is twisty-turny with pretty much everyone planning at some point to assassinate the Dalai Lama. The story develops at a nice pace, with some great diversions, like Gang's sudden addiction to American fast food or Angel's on-air verbal sparring matches with Winne Chung, the chair of the U.S.-China Co-Dependency Council (complete with a literary cameo by Hardball's Chris Matthews). The eventual resolution of what becomes the main issue of the novel (which I won't give away but which I will say involves a dispute over the Dalai Lama) is ingenious and actually shows that Bird isn't a complete moron. But there were some parts of the end, mostly involving a surprising development in Bird's spirituality, that fell flat and were sort of unbelievable.

In the end, I liked this novel well enough and would recommend people read it but it's not one that I read over and over again. It's a timely piece of fiction that satirizes the current zeitgeist regarding China and which manages to show the complexity of the issue in a very prescient way, but Angel's constant conservative babble and Bird's odd transformation at the end left me feeling a little...eh.

I'm giving They Eat Puppies, Don't They? four out of five Gabriels.

-Gabe

Out Amongst the Stars: A Review of Stanislaw Lem's The Star Diaries

Title: The Star Diaries
Author: Stanislaw Lem (translated by Michael Kandel)
Edition: Hardcover (Seabury Press, 1976)
Pages: 275
How I Came by This Book: I was looking for sci-fi authors I'd never read and Lem's name came up. I acquired this from the library I work at.

About the Author: Stanisław Lem (12 September 1921 – 27 March 2006) was a Polish science fiction, philosophical and satirical writer. His books have been translated into 41 languages and have sold over 27 million copies. He is perhaps best known as the author of Solaris, which has twice been made into a feature film. In 1976, Theodore Sturgeon claimed that Lem was the most widely read science-fiction writer in the world.

His works explore philosophical themes; speculation on technology, the nature of intelligence, the impossibility of mutual communication and understanding, despair about human limitations and humankind's place in the universe. They are sometimes presented as fiction, but others are in the form of essays or philosophical books. Translations of his works are difficult and multiple translated versions of his works exist.

Lem became truly productive after 1956, when the de-Stalinization period led to the "Polish October", when Poland experienced an increase in freedom of speech. Between 1956 and 1968, Lem authored 17 books. His works were widely translated abroad (although mostly in the Eastern Bloc countries). In 1957 he published his first non-fiction, philosophical book, Dialogi (Dialogues). Dialogi and Summa Technologiae (1964) are his two most famous philosophical texts. The Summa is notable for being a unique analysis of prospective social, cybernetic, and biological advances. In this work, Lem discusses philosophical implications of technologies that were completely in the realm of science fiction then, but are gaining importance today - like, for instance, virtual reality and nanotechnology. Over the next few decades, he published many books, both science fiction and philosophical/futurological, although from the 1980s onwards he tended to concentrate on philosophical texts and essays.

He gained international fame for The Cyberiad, a series of humorous short stories from a mechanical universe ruled by robots, first published in English in 1974. His best-known novels include Solaris (1961), His Master's Voice (Głos pana, 1968), and the late Fiasco (Fiasko, 1987), expressing most strongly his major theme of the futility of mankind's attempts to comprehend the truly alien. Solaris was made into a film in 1972 by Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky and won a Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 1972[7]; in 2002, Steven Soderbergh directed a Hollywood remake starring George Clooney. (from GoodReads)

Synopsis: Ijon Tichy is an amiable, innocent cosmic traveler with a magnetic attraction for mishaps of the most unusual kinds; his absurd adventures and misfortunes make pointed and occasionally not-so-gentle mockery of various twentieth-century beliefs and institutions.

Called into question as Tichy is best by mind-boggling time warps and "civilizations" that are curious, to say the least, are: science and the rational mind, human progress, the "rightness" of the  universe, theology and Christianity, the sanctity of life, motherhood--and a host of other things that we tend to take for granted, and even pride ourselves on.

In compensation for this intellectual rock-throwing, the reader will be entertained by Lem's masterful creations, including the sadomasochistic robots of Cercia (who talk like Chaucer), the squamp hunt wherein squamp (huge beasts with impervious armor) are literally invaded and conquered within, accounts of Tichy's unwitting cannibalism, and his personal quarrel with Plato.

The reader may find, however--and this is characteristic of Lem's deft satire--that the laughter is often at his own expense.

Review: I love satire and I love sci-fi, so a satirical sci-fi book was right up my proverbial alley. While I wouldn't really classify this as actual sci-fi, there are fantastical adventures in space, so I guess it fits the bill somewhat. It is first and foremost a satirical/philosophical kind of book. The tales of inter-galactic traveler Ijon Tichy turn a critical eye toward everything from Communism to history to the human race in general. And they do it with a wicked sense of humor. 

The novel is actually a series of short stories labelled as different voyages. The seventh voyage is about a time when Tichy went through a series of gravitational vortices and ended up with multiple versions of himself all quarreling with each other. The fourteenth voyage follows him as he visits another planet in order to hunt squamp. The twenty-first voyage is a philosophical treatise on the nature of life and forced evolution. As the translator's note states, the voyages are put in numerical order for this book (as Lem intended them to be read), but they weren't written in that order. Therefore, the stories vary in terms of structure, quality, length, etc., although they still carry the same darkly humorous tone and the same mockery of humanity and our history. As Kandel states in that note, however, "the reader, looking chronologically, will find a definite shift from playful anecdote to pointed satire to outright philosophy (p. 274)." As I didn't read them chronologically, I wasn't able to get a real sense of how he grew as an author in that way, but you can definitely see the differences in the stories throughout the book. 

Ijon Tichy is the only constant figure in these stories and is a pretty likeable fellow. He's a bit pompous and can be a little cantankerous, but he's funny and interesting and his observations about life, the universe, and everything are prescient. I think that in some ways he could be considered an unreliable narrator (especially after reading the twenty-eighth voyage, which I didn't really like), but I don't know if that was Lem's original intent or if that idea developed over the course of writing these stories. I think that if the stories were to be read in chronological order it would be easier to see Ijon's character development just like it would be easier to see Lem's development as a writer. Instead, the order of the tales leaves Ijon in a continuous limbo: here he's a bit of an oafish ass, there he's a more mature and more thoughtful person, etc. 

Some of the stories drag (I'm looking at you twenty-first voyage!), but others are a lot of fun to read. My personal favorites are the seventh, eighth, eleventh, and, especially, the twentieth. The fact that all of the stories have a unique feel, voice, and overall message make it an interesting book all around, but I prefer the more humorous/satirical stories to the philosophical ones. If you only read one of these stories, I would suggest the twentieth. It's about how Ijon is forced to go to the future to work with an agency trying to correct history and ends up making it worse (with a bit of a twist and a lot of punny plays on the names of historical figures). It's hilarious and thought-provoking. 

I think the main thing that The Star Diaries accomplishes is to make the reader think. You think about science and unbridled progress; you think about religion and whether or not its a good thing or a bad thing; you think about individualism and how horrible it would be to lose it; you think about humanity and how we would look to outsiders who live peaceful, constructive lives. 

I'm giving The Star Diaries 4 out of 5 Gabriels. It's a good book with some slow parts that kind of detract from the enjoyment of it. As much as I like reading books that make you think, I'd rather not get sleepy while I do it. Also, I REALLY hated the twenty-eighth voyage. I'd read the book again, but I'd skip certain stories the next time I did. 

-Gabe

Dead Funny: A Review of Death: A Life by George Pendle

Oh my gods! It's a review! That's right, kids, Gabe's back in business. :D

Title: Death: A Life
Author: Death (and George Pendle)
Edition: Paperback
Publisher: Three Rivers Press (2008)
Pages: 272 pages
How I Came By This Book: This was recommended to me by Jo from Fluidity of Time as part of the massive list of suggestions I got from followers last month. It was acquired through my library's Interlibrary Loan service because I couldn't find this book anywhere nearby.
Challenges: GoodReads 2011 Reading Challenge

Synopsis: At last, the mysterious, feared, and misunderstood being known only as "Death" talks frankly and unforgettably about his infinitely awful existence. Chronicling his abusive childhood, his near-fatal addiction to Life, his excruciating time in rehab, and the ultimate triumph of his true nature, this long-awaited autobiography finally reveals the inner story of one of the most troubling, and troubled, figures in history. For the first time, Death reveals his affairs with the living, his maltreatment at the hands of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, the ungodly truth behind the infamous "Jesus Incident," and the loneliness of being the End of All Things.

Intense, unpredictable, and instantly engaging, Death: A Life is not only a story of triumph against all odds, but also a tender, moving tale of unconditional love in a universe that, despite its profound flaws, gave Death the fiery determination to carve out a successful existence on his own terms.

George Pendle
(Funnily enough, for some reason I
pictured him as being much older
and with white hair. Not sure why.)

Review: When this book finally came in through ILL I immediately flipped through it because I was curious as to how the book would look. When I imagined an autobiography of Death, I didn't picture photos with cheeky captions, by that's exactly what I found. Death: A Life is a funny, irreverent novel that begins before the creation of all things and carries the reader down through history from the perspective of the man in black, Death.

Jo, who recommended this to me, said that she didn't "know if [she] would recommend it for a reader who considers themselves to be religiously devout" because "they might consider it to be blasphemous." While I don't have an overly-religious bone in my body and am, therefore, unfazed by blasphemy, I will say that I agree with her that people who are very religious might find it to be offensive.

Death is the son of Satan and Sin and spent most of his childhood living in Hell until his father decided to move the family to the newly-created Earth in order to cause some mayhem. Satan amuses himself by switching all of the name tags that God has carefully put on his new creations while Death struggles to find a place for himself in the grand scheme of things. When a unicorn is killed by the Tree of Mishap (not to be confused with the Tree of Knowledge, the Tree of Sarcasm, the Tree of Dismemberment, or, really any other of the numerous "Trees of" that were placed in the Garden of Eden), Death finds his calling in taking the souls of dead things.

What follows is the story of his being the End of All Things from the Garden of Eden to the present day. Throughout the novel, Death takes us deep inside his thoughts on life, death, religion, humanity, animals, the world, pretty much anything that interests him...and everything interests him. We see historical events through his eyes, most of them wildly re-imagined, and are treated to a very different perspective of God, Jesus, the angels, Satan, ancient civilization, the list goes on. The book will more than likely piss off religious people, but, for those of us who have no real tie to religion, it's a very funny read.

The humor, however, strays incredibly often into the realm of puns, which I'm not really a huge fan of. A lot of this book is truly funny but other parts of it are only funny if you really enjoy corny plays on words. After a while, Deaths puns got to be more annoying than funny and really dragged the book down a peg. I've read other novels featuring the personification of Death that had a more sarcastic or dry approach and I find that I personally prefer this side of Death's sense of humor.

Image by blackpoint.

Yet, behind all of the puns and the unfavorable portrayal of everything from religion to unicorns, Death: A Life really has a deeper meaning, as most books about Death do--what does it mean to be alive? What does it mean to be human? Is life a good thing or a bad thing? Our dear narrator, Death, becomes addicted to Life, to the point where he's thrown into rehab, all stemming from his falling in love with a woman named Maud, who is constantly reincarnated due to a clerical error. I won't say that their relationship is "poignant," partly because the word is overused and partly because it really wasn't, but it was an interesting way to explore the idea of love and of its affect on the human spirit.

While this book wasn't a great philosophical treatise or anything, as a satire, it turns the world on its head and looks at it through the lens of the ridiculous. Death: A Life isn't the greatest satire I've ever read, but it was a fun, easy read that I enjoyed for the sheer insanity of it. I loved Death's story of Methuselah and how his date of death had never been set down so he was constantly trying to get Death to take him. He would try to get himself killed but it never happened and so he walked through life begging Death to make an exception for him. I was also a fan of his time in rehab, which was sadly funny.

One thing that I didn't like was his portrayal of the angel Gabriel...for obvious reasons. A sycophantic meddler who tends to mess things up, this version of Gabriel is my least favorite out of all of his incarnations in film and literature. It was kind of like how I loved Neil Gaiman's American Gods but disliked his portrayal of the Egyptian god, Horus, as a freaky madman (Horus has always been my favorite god from Egyptian mythology). While others may hate the way Pendle portrays God or might be offended by the way his version of Jesus acts, I'm taking the selfish route and saying that anyone who shares my name should be too awesome for words and this time Gabriel just didn't meet that requirement.

The Eye of Horus

So, the short version of this review is: really enjoyed it but I thought the use of puns was excessive. Don't read it if you're easily offended by people making light of your religion.

I'm giving Death: A Life four out of five Gabriels.

Some People Are Too Interesting to Kill: A Review of Seth Grahame-Smith's Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter

Synopsis: Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter is, well, about Abraham Lincoln hunting vampires. It's the brainchild of Seth Grahame-Smith, the man who brought the world Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. It follows the life of Abraham Lincoln from his birth to his assassination, except that there are vampires involved. Lots of them.

Review: I really didn't expect to like this novel. In addition to my silly personal beef with Abe Lincoln, I really don't like historical fiction, whether it be books or films. As someone with a BA in History, I tend to look down on the genre as a whole because I see blatant historical inaccuracies, misuse of primary sources (if they aren't ignored altogether), and wooden characters set in front of a historical backdrop that is, at best, a parody of what actually occurred. So, even though I was looking forward to reading this book, I wasn't expecting anything great.

I loved it. After a somewhat slow beginning, the book picked up and ran, taking me on a wonderful--but highly re-imagined--romp through the 1800s. Grahame-Smith manages to make both Abraham Lincoln and vampires ridiculously awesome and he brings a fun new twist to the Civil War--and American history in general.

After the death of Lincoln's beloved mother at the hands of a vampire, young Abe vows to hunt and kill every vampire in America. This is a pretty tall order for someone so young and untrained in the art of war, but Lincoln reads and studies on his own in order to prepare himself to kill the vampire that killed his mother and any other creature of the night that crosses his path. His first kill goes well but his next one? Let's just say that it could have been better.

Enter Henry, a mysterious figure who saves Lincoln's life. It is soon revealed that Henry is himself a vampire but as he nurses Abe back to health, the two form a tentative friendship. Henry tells him everything he needs to know about hunting and killing vampires. He also tells Lincoln something else: that he has a special destiny. From there the book follows Lincoln as he kills vampires, falls in love, enters politics, and, eventually, wins the presidency.

I was surprised at how well the book really did follow his life. I don't consider myself an expert on Lincoln, but being forced to read four books about him at least gave me enough background knowledge to know that much of what happened in the book is based off of real events--minus the vampires, of course. Most of the characters in this book were real people; it is only the details of the situations they were in that has been changed.

For example, Edgar Allan Poe makes an appearance in the book. He was a contemporary of Abraham Lincoln and Lincoln was an admirer of his literature. The two, however, probably never met and they certainly did not have a close friendship like they do in the book. Ann Rutledge, who has often been rumored to have been Lincoln's first love, although it has never been definitively proved, plays a major role towards the middle of the book but the vampire-y details of her story are obviously not real. Similarly, William Seward, Lincoln's Secretary of State, is a major character in the narrative of both this book and of Lincoln's life. (In fact, he's always been my favorite member of Lincoln's cabinet, although I really can't explain why.) He definitely was not, however, a vampire hunter, although this bit of characterization in the book made me appreciate him even more than I already did.

William H. Seward was a B.A.M.F.

Vampires are weaved into the story entirely. They are, in fact, the real reason behind and the true enemy during the Civil War. Without giving the reasons why away, I will say that Grahame-Smith does a pretty good job of folding the vampire mythos into the events of the Civil War and of Lincoln's life. While I'm not really a fan of vampires, I felt that the way they were portrayed in this novel was brilliant. They are not all attractive, they are not all evil, and they definitely do not sparkle. They are also violent psychopaths, leading to some gruesome and graphic, but really amazing, scenes. There are parts of this book that are not for the faint of heart or the weak of stomach.

The character who I think rises above the rest in this novel is the vampire Henry. From the moment he first entered the story, I was immediately drawn to him as a character. I wanted to know more about him. Why did he save Lincoln? Why is he trying to help him kill vampires? And why is he so damn awesome? One of the coolest things about Henry's story is the use Grahame-Smith makes of the Roanoke Colony mystery. His relationship with Lincoln is intriguing as well. It's really his personality and the way he speaks, however, that made him my favorite character.

One of the things I loved most about this book was the way it resembled an actual biography of Lincoln. The idea behind the novel is that the author was given Lincoln's secret vampire-hunting journals and was asked to tell the world the truth about him. Much of the novel is told through quotes from this journal, giving it the feel of a work of non-fiction that is relying heavily on primary source material. Grahame-Smith also uses quotes from some of Lincoln's speeches (such as the Gettysburg address and his second inaugural address), as well as things that the president is purported to have said (such as the Lincoln family legend that when Abe first met his future wife, Mary Todd, he told her that he wanted to "dance with [her] in the worst way").

There are also real photos of Lincoln in the book, all of them Photoshopped in order to fit in with the story. I think my favorite is the doctored version of the famous photo of Lincoln and McClellan that was taken shortly before Lincoln fired him, giving command of the Union army to Grant. The only change made to the photo (at least that I can tell) is the addition of an ax, which, the author explains, Lincoln brought along with him just in case the inept McClellan turned out to be a vampire instead of just a piss-poor general.

In another show of Grahame-Smith's genius, shortly after I began reading the novel I got the feeling that I had seen it somewhere before. It wasn't until about the fourth chapter that I realized why that was:

This is a page from Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.

This is a page from Doris Kearns Goodwin's Team of Rivals.

Grahame-Smith adopted a similar format for his book as Doris Kearns Goodwin had in her book on the political genius of Abraham Lincoln, Team of Rivals. It was one of the four books that I had to read for my senior seminar class and it was actually amazing to me that I even picked up on that small detail.

The book does have some faults, of course. There are a few instances of wrong information (e.g., at one point Grahame-Smith inexplicably states that Lincoln's birthday was February 9th even though he had earlier mentioned the correct date of February 12th) and I felt that sometimes the quotes from Lincoln's supposed journal were too liberally applied, but things like that can be overlooked when a story is this good.

And it really is good. Frequently funny, as well. One of Lincoln's journal entries about his time serving in the Illinois militiamen during a conflict with some Native American's reads:

My men have suffered greatly (from boredom), much blood has been shed (by mosquitoes), and I have swung my ax mightily (chopping firewood). Surely we have earned our place in the annals of history--for never has there been so little war in a war (p. 145).

Lincoln's friendship with Jack Armstrong provides some very funny moments (especially the scene where they are hunting a vampire while Abe is suffering from love sickness) and many of the scenes with Lincoln's children are poignantly funny. All in all, Grahame-Smith does an excellent job of bringing to life this fictional version of Abraham Lincoln. He makes him not only likable, but also pretty freaking hardcore as well.

A quick note about the ending: Without giving away the very last chapter of the book, I wanted to say that there are probably some people who won't like it, but I actually really did. I felt that one of the great things about it was that it had been hinted at throughout the book so it wasn't really a surprise to me when it happened. It's like in a science fiction film where the day is saved by something implausible but the audience goes with it because that implausibility had been introduced at the beginning of the movie. It doesn't work if you don't talk about it early on, but if you do the audience will pretty much accept it. That's what the last chapter of this book was like for me.

There is so much more I could say about this book but most of it would probably be boring because it all has to do with the way Grahame-Smith intertwined fact and fiction. I was really amazed at how well he did it; even if the story itself was implausible, he made me want it to be real and he twisted fact just enough that for a moment you could almost imagine that it was.

I'm giving Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter five out of five stars. I borrowed this book from the library but I've decided that the next time I can afford to buy a few books that this is going to be on the top of the pile. It's that good.

-Gabe

PS: The video below is a slideshow of Abe Lincoln set to Aaron Copland's "A Lincoln Portrait". It's a really beautiful piece of music that is accompanied by some of Lincoln's most famous utterances. I've actually performed this piece before and the narration for that concert was provided by a retired military official who had a really powerful voice. This isn't that recording, but it's definitely worth taking a listen to.

The End is Near...and Hilarious: A Review of Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett

From the back cover:

The world will end on Saturday. Next Saturday. Just before dinner, according to The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch, the world's only completely accurate book of prophecies written in 1655. The armies of good and evil are amassing and everything appears to be going according to Divine Plan. Except that a somewhat fussy angel and a fast-living demon are not actually looking forward to the coming rapture. And someone sees to have misplaced the Antichrist.

My Review:

Aziraphale and Crowley are two immortals with a big problem: the looming Apocalypse. It's not that they're against the idea, per se. As an angel and a demon, respectively, they are expected to support their side in the final battle between good and evil. It's just that, after being on Earth since the beginning...well, they've started to kind of like it. Now, it's up to them to try and stop it.

Good Omens was co-written by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. They are, arguably, two of the funniest writers on the market today. Pratchett's satirical Discworld books never fail to make me laugh and Gaiman's dark humor gives even more depth to his already well-written novels. In this satire of the Apocalypse, both of their senses of humor compliment each other. While they never really talk about who wrote what, people who are well-read in both authors can catch glimpses here and there of material that is easily recognizable as belonging to one or the other.

This is at least the fourth (if not the fifth) time that I've read this book. In fact, when I first read it all those summers ago, I immediately reread it--something I'd never done before or since. It wasn't just the humor (which is superb) or the plot (which is well-crafted) or the characters (which are extremely likable). It was all of these elements put together, plus the way in which the authors used the subject of the end of the world as a way to explore human nature. For those of you who haven't read the book before and who see it as a fluffy, insubstantial novel, this might seem to be a bit of a stretch. But that is, after all, one of the things that a good satire does. It's something at which Pratchett, especially, excels.

Crowley, the demon, thinks that he's figured out the true nature of homo sapiens. He realizes that no matter how much demons and other minions of Hell wheedle away at a soul and make people do horrible things, humans will always one up them:

...he did his best to make their short lives miserable...but nothing he could think up was half as bad as the stuff they thought up themselves. They seemed to have a talent for it. It was built into the design, somehow. They were born into a world that was against them in a thousand little ways, and then devoted most of their energies to making it worse (p. 33).

Humans are also portrayed as being somewhat blind. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse are in their midst and they pretty much ignore them:

Perhaps they saw nothing at all. Perhaps they saw what their minds were instructed to see, because the human brain is not equipped to see War, Famine, Pollution*, and Death when they don't want to be seen, and has got so good at not seeing that it often manages not to see them even when they abound on every side (p. 313).

But Aziraphale, the angel, knows that humans can just as often be good. In fact, it is precisely because they have such a capacity for evil that they also have such a capacity for real good, and vice versa. I think one of my favorite quotes in the entire book pretty much sums it all up: "It may help to understand human affairs to be clear that most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused, not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally bad, but by people being fundamentally people (p. 26)."

The book is, however, at its heart, a really funny story about the Apocalypse. This is one of those novels that's just as funny the first time as it is the fifth time. In fact, I'd argue that it gets funnier over time, mostly because in the time since I first read it I've learned some things that have helped me understand a joke better--like why November 5th is so important or who the hell Dick Turpin is. Much of the humor comes from exchanges between characters that are far too long to post here and that are much better in context, such as the great discussion that Aziraphale and Crowley have early on in the book about gorillas or the conversation between Newt and the cop-like aliens from space.

That having been said, there are a lot of great one liners and small moments as well, e.g.:

• pg. 151: "Many people, meeting Aziraphale for the first time, formed three impressions: that he was English, that he was intelligent, and that he was gayer than a tree full of monkeys on nitrous oxide."
• pg. 188: "You do know that you could find yourself charged with being a dominant species while under the influence of impulse-driven consumerism, don't you?"

Readers who are fans of Pratchett's Discworld, will be happy to know that Death plays a role in this book as well. He's not the same exact Death that's portrayed in those novels, but he does have the same dry humor. He even speaks in his typical all-caps manner.

For example, the Four Horsemen actually ride motorcycles and they meet up for the first time at a diner in the middle of nowhere. The only other people inside are four other bikers, only one of which has actually read a Bible (and that only because he had to hole up in a hotel for three months while on the run from the law and it was the only book available). So when these guys see that the Horsemen are wearing Hell's Angels jackets, they get sort of suspicious; these guys don't look like Hell's Angels. One of the bikers asks them which chapter they're from and Death replies: REVELATIONS. CHAPTER SIX. It's probably my favorite moment in the entire book.

I could probably go on for the next millennium about how much I love this book. I could talk about how the plot is engrossing, the action well-paced, the characters realistic and yet fantastic all at the same time. I could mention that the ending is satisfactory and that the rest of the book builds up to it nicely. I could even dare you NOT to absolutely adore Crowley and Aziraphale (I personally don't think it can be done). But I won't.

Instead, I will simply implore you to read this book. It's one of the only novels in the world that I have been able to reread so many times and I know that I'm not alone in that. Good Omens is one of those rare gems. It's not necessarily a literary classic (at least, it's not in the same realm as Dickens or Austen), but it is, I think, a timeless book...even if some of the things it talks about are a little outdated (Sony Walkmans, car phones, etc.). Underneath all the humor and the peril is a real story about what makes us human--the good, the bad, and everything in between.

*Pestilence decided to throw in the towel after the invention of penicillin and was replaced.

-Gabe