Saturday, April 27, 2013

Gator Update (Amnesty Edition)

Three alligators handed over at illegal reptile amnesty day on Long Island

Free for Kindle for a Limited Time

The Hold Up web.jpgAmazon.com: The Hold Up (Rancho Diablo) eBook: Colby Jackson, Mel Odom, Bill Crider, James Reasoner: Kindle Store: When Randy Post, a young cowboy riding for the Rancho Diablo brand, gets accused of murdering a saloon girl, Sam Blaylock saddles up to get to the bottom of the matter before they fit him for a hangman's noose. Sam doesn't know that the murder has set off a chain of events that will end up with him swapping lead with a murderous gang of robbers eyeing one of the banks in Shooter's Cross. 


In the past, Marshal Everett Tolliver and Sam Blaylock haven't seen exactly eye-to-eye on things involving the ranch hands. Tolliver intends to hold the peace in town no matter what the cost. But he's going to need help if he's going to find out who murdered Jessie Holden in cold blood. 

Even after they've set there differences aside for the time being, Sam and Tolliver still have to put their lives at risk to hold the line in Shooter's Cross in a gundown on Main Street that will become a legend.

Song of the Day

"Lawyers, Guns and Money" by Warren Zevon - YouTube:

Emilie and the Hollow World -- Martha Wells

Emilie and the Hollow World is Martha Wells' first book specifically for a YA audience, though I think her Raksura novels would fit right into any YA collection.

Let me say right off the bat that I'm a sucker for hollow world stories.  Put me in Pellucidar or send me off on a journey to the center of the Earth, and I'm a happy guy.  So naturally I was predisposed to like this book.  It doesn't disappoint.

The story takes place on an Earth-like world in a steam-punky time in which sorcerers can work with the aetheric current and find pathways to the underground world, which can be reached through the sea or through an opening like a volcano.  The first man to make such a journey has disappeared, and his daughter, Lady Marlende, has mounted an expedition to go and look for him.

Emilie is a runaway, and with good reasons, which we discover as the story moves along.  She wants to go to live with her cousin and go to school.  To get there, she has to stowaway on a ship.  Her plans are upset by some mysterious doings on the docks, and she winds up on the Sovereign, the ship that's about to descend below the ocean.  By the time she's discovered, the trip is underway and the adventures have begun.

Wells is excellent, as always, at world-building, and the societies that Emilie and the others encounter are interesting and believable.  There's plenty of intrigue, danger, and action, too, and Emilie proves herself more than capable of dealing with just about any emergency.  If you read YA fiction, this one is great fun and should be on your list.

Today's Vintage Ad


5 Shopping Sprees So Wild, They Made History

5 Shopping Sprees So Wild, They Made History

Link via mental_floss.

Top 10 Directors Who Played Secondary Roles In Their Own Movies

Top 10 Directors Who Played Secondary Roles In Their Own Movies

PaperBack



Hal Braham, Call Me Deadly, Graphic, 1957

Once Again Texas Leads the Way

Houston Once More Shows America Exactly Where The Country Will Be in Twenty Years 

20 Amazing Outdoor Libraries and Bookstores From All Over the World

20 Amazing Outdoor Libraries and Bookstores From All Over the World

Here's the Plot for Your Next Big Antiquities Forgery Thriller

This Functional Yet Miniscule Gold Skeleton Can Be Yours On Monday

What Are the Greatest Country Albums Ever?

What Are the Greatest Country Albums Ever?

The Folio Society: Devoted to Beautiful Books

The Icelandic Sagas edited by Magnus MagnussonAbeBooks: The Folio Society: Devoted to Beautiful Books: Standing like an island amid the sea of cheap mass produced paperbacks and formulaic new releases from the latest bright young things is the Folio Society. This organization is half publisher, half book club (as it has members) and was founded in 1947 on the principle that books should be beautiful to the eye as well as captivating to the mind.

Phantom Patrol

1936 KERMIT MAYNARD PHANTOM PATROL TRAILER - YouTube:

Friday, April 26, 2013

Here's the Plot for Your Next Wartime Literary Thrilller

New documents reveal A.A. Milne was a secret wartime propagandist 

Free for Kindle for a Limited Time

Amazon.com: Heaven's Fire (A Fireworks Thriller) eBook: Sandra Balzo: Kindle Store: "Heaven's Fire" may be what Pasquale Firenze, patriarch of the family-owned Firenze Fireworks, calls his painting of the night sky with light, color and sound, but television producer Wendy "Jake" Jacobus has more practical considerations than her featured showman's artistry. Or so she believes, until Pasquale is killed--live on-camera--by an explosion, and Jake is hurled into a tangled web triggered by her job, her legacy as a cancer survivor, and her growing attraction to Simon Aamot, the federal agent assigned to the investigation. 

Aamot has problems as well, but when the two are forced together by the tragedy, the man unable to let go of his past and the woman afraid to trust her future must race to prevent another catastrophic explosion--this one at the county's Fourth of July celebration.

PimPage: An Occasional Feature in Which I Call Attention to Books of Interest

Amazon.com: Mafiya eBook: Charlie Stella: Kindle Store: The Russian Mob is on the rise in New York City, but the younger brother of the boss is making waves taking risks that can bring down everybody--a snuff film unsanctioned by the boss. A former prostitute, Agnes Lynn, loses her best friend to the younger brother of the Russian Mob and seeks revenge. A starred review crime novel that intrigues start to finish.

30 Treasures Unearthed From Oklahoma's 1913 Time Capsule

30 Treasures Unearthed From Oklahoma's 1913 Time Capsule

PimPage: An Occasional Feature in Which I Call Attention to Books of Interest

Amazon.com: When Mars Attacked: Orson Welles, The War of the Worlds & the Radio Broadcast That Changed America Forever eBook: David Acord: Kindle Store


On October 30, 1938, Orson Welles broadcast a radio adaptation of H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds…and the country would never again be the same. Written in a realistic style that mimicked “breaking news” bulletins, the play convinced listeners from coast to coast that the United States was actually being invaded by Martians. The ensuing panic made Welles an overnight sensation – and one of the most hated men in America. 

The War of the Worlds panic was one of the twentieth century’s defining moments, and remains an indelible part of our culture. But serious questions and misconceptions still linger. Did Orson Welles actually intend to “trick” the American public? Was the broadcast a hoax or an unfortunate accident? Did listeners commit suicide and drive their cars off of bridges, as rumors claimed? How exactly did he come up with the idea in the first place? And most importantly – why did so many people believe that what they were hearing on the radio was real? 

When Mars Attacked tells the riveting true story of the broadcast: Orson Welles’ sudden rise to fame in the mid-1930s; the social and political forces of the Great Depression and an impending World War that aligned to create a “perfect storm” of anxiety leading up to the broadcast; the massive controversy that followed in its wake; and the untold story of how close the country came to imposing sweeping restrictions on free speech in order to ensure that nothing like The War of the Worlds panic ever happened again. 

Incorporating never-before-seen government documents and rare correspondence locked away in the National Archives for decades, When Mars Attacked is a first-rate nonfiction account of a pivotal moment in American history. Author and veteran Washington, D.C. journalist David Acord offers a vivid retelling of that fateful night in 1938, essentially re-reporting the chaos minute by minute just as it unfolded, in a fast-paced, riveting “tick-tock” fashion. 

The War of the Worlds still haunts us, and offers a sobering lesson on what can happen when embattled citizens lose both hope and their sense of perspective in the midst of dismal economic conditions and international military threats. Although it was broadcast more than seven decades ago, Orson Welles’ radio play is more relevant than ever.

Song of the Day

George Jones ,HE STOPPED LOVING HER TODAY - YouTube:

Gator Update (Golf Edition)

Three-Legged Alligator Crosses Fairway During Golf Tournament

Video at the link.
Hat tip to Angela Neary.

The 50 Greatest Summer Blockbusters of All Time

The 50 Greatest Summer Blockbusters of All Time 

Today's Vintage Ad


George Jones, R. I. P.

George Jones, country superstar, has died at 81: George Jones, whose supple Texas voice conveyed heartbreak so profound that he became perhaps the most imitated singer in country music, died Friday at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville after being hospitalized with high fever and irregular blood pressure. He was 81.

Harlan Ellison Update

Harlan Ellison Still Has a Mouth, Thankfully Still Screaming

Before-They-Were-Famous "Murder, She Wrote" Guest Stars

Before-They-Were-Famous "Murder, She Wrote" Guest Stars

PaperBack



Leonard Lupton, Murder Without Tears, Graphic, 1957

25 Vintage Photos of Librarians Being Awesome

25 Vintage Photos of Librarians Being Awesome 

12 Things Every "The Great Gatsby" Buff Should Know

12 Things Every "The Great Gatsby" Buff Should Know

10 Minor TV Characters Who Stole the Show

10 Minor TV Characters Who Stole the Show

The Favorite Books of 32 Famous People

The Favorite Books of 32 Famous People 

Gator Update (Turtle Edition)

Turtle shell withstands 15 minute attack as alligator fails to crack its shell 

Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

I Miss the Old Days

The First Book of Firemen, 1951

40 Words You Can Trace Back To William Shakespeare

40 Words You Can Trace Back To William Shakespeare

Has the Persecution Ended?

Miss Hilton debuts softer look while posing in her bra for Monroe inspired image 

Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

Forgotten Books: A Dark Traveling -- Roger Zelazny

It's hard for me to believe that Roger Zelazny is in danger of becoming a forgotten writer, but I suppose he is.  When I came back to SF in the late '60s after having been away for a few years, Zelazny was one of the first writers that I hadn't known before whose work really hooked me.  I'd buy anything he wrote.  Somewhere along the way, he lost some of his magic (at least for me), but bits and pieces of it still showed up in just about any work of his.  He wrote one YA novel.  This is it.  It came along after the magic was gone, but it's still an entertaining book.

It's also pretty hard to describe because the plot is pretty complicated once you sit down and start thinking about it.  The story begins, as a lot of Zelazny's work does, in the middle of things.  The reader doesn't know what's going on, and it takes a while to catch up.  In the prologue, a girl named Becky, a witch, is having visions.  She doesn't know what they mean, and neither does the reader.  Some of them don't become clear until the very end of the book.  

Aside from the prologue, the book is narrated by James Wiley, who's fourteen and who's a werewolf, though he's never gone through a complete transformation yet.  Becky is his sister, except that she's really not, and his brother, Barry, isn't really his brother, either.  His father, who's really his father has disappeared.  There's blood on the floor, and the transcomp is damaged.  

Eventually we find out that a transcomp allows people to travel between the many alternate timelines, timelines created when a certain event causes one line to branch off from another.  There are three different kinds of timelines, and people who have a transcomp can visit all of them.  Naturally there are some you don't want to visit.

All of that is just the setup, but you can probably guess that there's going to be some timeline travel, that there are big events involved, and that James Wiley will go through a full transformation.  The best writing in the book, and the most like the Zelazny I enjoy, is the transformation scene. Great stuff.  Maybe the best werewolf transformation ever.  The rest of the book doesn't live up to it, but it's very short, it's a good adventure, and I got a little fun out of reading it again.

Thursday, April 25, 2013

Uh-Oh or OK?

Shane Black hints that Doc Savage could be next for him to direct

Hat tip to Doc Quatermass.

PimPage: An Occasional Feature in Which I Call Attention to Books of Interest

Amazon.com: My Short, Happy Life In "Jeopardy!" eBook: Brendan DuBois: Kindle Store: From award-winning mystery author Brendan DuBois comes this unique and inside view of America's favorite gameshow, "Jeopardy!" 

As a lifelong reader, fan of trivia and watcher of "Jeopardy!", DuBois tried twice to become a contestant on this Emmy-award winning show. But the third time proved to be a charm as he successfully auditioned for the program, and flew from his rural New Hampshire home to Los Angeles to tape his appearance and go head-to-head among some of the smartest people in America. 

Along the way he reveals information such as: 

-- The best way to prepare as a contestant. 

-- Important websites you should visit, and books you should read. -- What's it like to be "behind the stage" as the show is taped. 

-- And hey, what's Alex Trebek really like?

American Tolkien

American Tolkien - Amazing Stories

Song of the Day

She's a Rainbow - Rolling Stones - YouTube:

10 Cult Classics The Critics Got Dead Wrong

10 Cult Classics The Critics Got Dead Wrong 

When Ya Gotta Go . . . .

NJ teacher fired for urinating in classroom

Today's Vintage Ad


Skull Fragments Must Be Secured in a See-Through Plastic Bag and Weigh Less than 6 Ounces

News - Home: Transportation Security Administration agents found pottery filled with dirt and human skull fragments inside a carry-on bag at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport.

Uh-Oh

'Lone Ranger' Armie Hammer To Star With Tom Cruise In 'Man From U.N.C.L.E.' 

14 Ways to Acquire Knowledge: A Timeless Guide from 1936

14 Ways to Acquire Knowledge: A Timeless Guide from 1936

To Err is Human: Typos in Literature

Moonraker by Ian Fleming, 1955 To Err is Human: Typos in Literature on AbeBooks: Most readers find typographical errors to be one of life's little annoyances, like being stuck at a traffic light when in a hurry.  For others, the publishing of a spelling or grammatical error is one of the most grievous mistakes imaginable. I personally enjoy a particularly silly error, and if it's done right, see it as a value-added perk to a book.  Perhaps it's because I am such a mind-bogglingly bad speller (any of my co-workers will attest to this). Whatever the reason, I enjoy when an ordinary sentence is rendered hilarious and turned on its ear by an incorrect homonym or rogue comma.

PaperBack



Richard Powell, Say it with Bullets, Graphic, 1954

5 Ridiculous Myths Everyone Believes About the Wild West

5 Ridiculous Myths Everyone Believes About the Wild West 

Will the Persecution Never End?

Gwyneth Paltrow named People magazine's “World’s Most Beautiful Woman”

Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

Take the Quiz and See

Science and Technology Knowledge Quiz: Do you know more about science and technology than the average American?

20 Female Movie Characters That Could Have Been Completely Different

20 Female Movie Characters That Could Have Been Completely Different

Forgotten Music

Arthur Alexander and the Beatles: Forgotten songwriter also inspired the Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan.

Once Again Texas Leads the Way

Sara Elizabeth Soto: Naked woman 'crawls through doggie door and is found in the bath'

Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

Here's the Plot for Your Next Rock 'n' Roll Thriller

U.S. country star Jerry Naylor who replaced Buddy Holly in the Crickets was a secret CIA agent who spied for America on 100 missions

Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

Cue Carly Simon Singing "Anticipation"

'Vanilla Ice Goes Amish' to debut on DIY this year 

Strawberry Roan

1933 KEN MAYNARD WESTERN TRAILER - YouTube:

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

The Inevitable Gator/Drug Connection Once Again

Man found with baby alligators also busted growing marijuana

Archaeology Update

New Straits Times: A small robot has discovered three possible burial chambers under a temple in Mexico’s pre-Hispanic city of Teotihuacan, a find that may reveal secrets about funeral rituals in the ancient site.  

The robot, dubbed Tlaloc II-TC, located the chambers in the last section of a 2,000-year-old tunnel tucked under the Temple of the Feathered Snake, surprising archaeologists who had expected to find just one room.

James Patterson speaks out about his aggressive “book industry bailout" ads

James Patterson speaks out about his aggressive “book industry bailout” ads 

First It Was the Thin Mints Melee. . . .

OKC police: Son set father on fire after argument over music

Fascinating Police Wanted Ad From 1888

Fascinating Police Wanted Ad From 1888

On Sale! Limited Time!

a vampire named fredA Vampire Named Fred by Bill Crider: $1.99 Discounted eBook Edition For A Limited Time Only!

Free for Kindle for a Limited Time

Where Serpents Lie (Revised March 2013): T. Jefferson Parker: Amazon.com: Kindle Store: A brilliant novel of one man's quest to protect the innocent, as he tries to face down a terrible guilt locked in his own past.

Matt Helm Fans, Take Note!

The Rap Sheet: Matt Helm Fans, Take Note!

Gwyneth Paltrow Has Been Named The World's Most Beautiful Woman

Gwyneth Paltrow Has Been Named The World's Most Beautiful Woman

Song of the Day

THE COWSILLS- INDIAN LAKE" (W/LYRICS) - YouTube:

I Miss the Old Days

9 extremely outdated etiquette tips from the 1950s

Link via mental_floss.

Today's Vintage Ad


Daily Rituals: A Guided Tour of Writers' and Artists' Creative Habits

Daily Rituals: A Guided Tour of Writers' and Artists' Creative Habits

“On Location in Paradise”

“On Location in Paradise” (by Hayford Peirce) | SOMETHING IS GOING TO HAPPEN

Could You Have Made a High Score?

Document Deep Dive: What Was on the First SAT?

PaperBack



Bruce Cassiday, While Murder Waits, Graphic, 1957

Yet Another List I'm Not On

The Madman Theory by Ellery Queen ghostwritten by Jack VanceTop 10 Ghostwritten Books as Chosen by AbeBooks: No matter where you go on the planet you will find tales of the supernatural. Spirits, spooks and spectres are everywhere. However, there is one reclusive mythical creature that particularly sparks fear in literary hearts – the ghostwriter.

J. D. Salinger Update

9 Letters From Young J. D. Salinger Unearthed - NYTimes.com: But this elusive author comes vividly to life in a series of letters he wrote from 1941 to 1943, which few people have seen in the 70 years since.

Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

Bram Stoker's Ever-Evolving List of Characters for Dracula

Bram Stoker's Dracula: How Dracula, Van Helsing, and other characters came to be.

Here's the Outline for Your Next Bank Robbery Thriller

I'm not kidding. The whole novels already there, waiting for you to write it.

In Virginia's Fairfax County, Robbing Banks for the CIA 

Here's the Plot for Your Next Gritty Jailhouse Soap Opera

Jailhouse Soap Opera: 13 Female Guards Indicted; 4 Impregnated By Same Inmate

And Keep off Her Lawn!

Chinese mother accused of killing shopkeeper by squeezing his testicles so hard he died of shock

Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

Will the Persecution Never End?

Mail Online: On Monday she was caught in the (illegal) act of texting and driving. 

Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

The McKenzie Break

The McKenzie Break Trailer - YouTube:

Tuesday, April 23, 2013

First It Was the Thin Mints Melee . . .

Pooping malt liquor drinker jailed in Vero Beach gunfire brouhaha

Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

Free Signed Bookplates for THE HEIST

Free Signed Bookplates for THE HEIST 

Allan Arbus, R. I. P

 The Hollywood Reporter: Allan Arbus, a top-notch photographer who left that business to become an actor, most notably starring as sardonic psychiatrist Maj. Sidney Freedman on the CBS hit series M*A*S*H, has died. He was 95.

PimPage: An Occasional Feature in Which I Call Attention to Books of Interest

The Dead Man Vol 5: The Death Match, The Black Death, and The Killing Floor: Lee Goldberg, William Rabkin, Christa Faust, Aric Davis, David Tully: 9781477807422: Amazon.com: Books: After dying in a freak accident, Matt Cahill inexplicably “wakes up” three months later with the disturbing ability to see things—terrible things—that others cannot. Drafted as a warrior in the battle between good and evil, Matt will stop at nothing to destroy the malevolent Mr. Dark. In The Dead Man Volume 5, a trio of sinister new stories tracks the reluctant hero on his nightmarish quest. 

Matt enters the violent world of underground cage fighting where a brutal DEATH MATCH becomes a fight-to-the-undead that could lead him to the truth about his reincarnation…or to a gruesome demise. 

THE BLACK DEATH is a deadly new form of crystal meth that turns users into black-eyed, homicidal maniacs. Matt must destroy the virulently addictive drug before the madness spreads from a backwoods community to the entire nation. 

A hydro-fracking operation resurrects an ancient, terrifying entity that pits Matt against Mr. Dark in an epic battle that began centuries ago and that will end today with the fate of mankind at stake on the blood-soaked dirt of THE KILLING FLOOR.

Croc Update (Local Legend Edition)

The Local: Nearly 40 years ago, the African nation of Mali gave former East Germany a baby crocodile as a gift. Now, Theophila is over three metres long and lives in Magdeburg's water treatment plant where she has become a local legend.

Song of the Day

Meco - Star Wars Theme-Cantina Band (1977).mp4 - YouTube:

Today's Vintage Ad


The 10 Best Book Endings

The 10 Best Book Endings

6 Mind-Blowing Things Recently Discovered From WWII

6 Mind-Blowing Things Recently Discovered From WWII

PaperBack



Milton K. Ozaki, Dressed to Kill, Graphic, 1956

Nervous? Tense? Try Chocolate.

Natural compounds in dark chocolate found to increase calmness

First It Was the Thin Mints Melee . . .

Driver jailed over naked, vacuum cleaner part-wielding police pursuit

The 23 Weirdest Pub Names In Britain

The 23 Weirdest Pub Names In Britain

The Questionable Fates of Famous Authors’ Birthplaces

The Questionable Fates of Famous Authors’ Birthplaces

The Collected Wisdom of ‘Mixed-Up Files’ Author E.L. Konigsburg

The Collected Wisdom of ‘Mixed-Up Files’ Author E.L. Konigsburg

Archaeology Update

guardian.co.uk: The remains of a woman who was buried almost 4,500 years ago has been discovered in a quarry in Berkshire wearing a precious necklace of gold beads – a particularly rare find from a woman's grave, when even her near contemporary, the Amesbury archer, the richest burial of the period ever found, only had two small gold hair ornaments.

7 Great Songs Written for TV Shows

7 Great Songs Written for TV Shows

Overlooked Movies: King Solomon's Mines

There's a good bit of nostalgia involved in these postings about overlooked movies.  I first saw this version of H. Rider Haggard's King Solomon's Mines when I was eight or nine years old, and that must have been just about the perfect time.  I have no doubt that seeing it had a huge influence on my tastes in reading and movies for the rest of my life. 

Stewart Granger plays Alan Quatermain, and he was great in the role of an angsty white hunter. This film and Scarmouche made me a fan for life.  And I had a crush on Deborah Kerr ever afterward.  She's a woman who's come to Africa looking for her husband, who's disappeared while searching for the fabled mines of King Solomon's.  Richard Carlson is her brother, who's come along to help out. 

Every movie (probably all Tarzan films) I'd seen about Africa up to this point in my life had been filmed on Hollywood back lots.  This one was the real thing, Africa in full Technicolor glory.  The scenery and action scenes are still breath-taking even now.

The movie is essentially a road trip through Africa, though there's plenty of plot, too, with secret tribes, a wrongly deposed king, villains, trial by combat, danger lurking everywhere, and of course those mines. Wonderful stuff.  I loved it when I was eight years old, and the eight-year-old that lives in me now loves it still.

King Solomon's Mines

King Solomon's Mines - Trailer (1950) - YouTube:

Monday, April 22, 2013

This Could be OK

FX Developing 1950s Hollywood Drama From Author James Ellroy: FX has bought a drama pitch from L.A. Confidential author James Ellroy and producers Joe Roth and Clark Peterson. Based on Ellroy’s 2012 novella Shakedown, the project is set in the tabloid world and underbelly of Los Angeles circa the late 1950s and centers on the city’s top informant/operator/wire tapper/fixer, Fred Otash, who lives and works where the glamour and the grime intersect.

First It Was the Thin Mints Melee . . .

Plant City man accused of slashing grandmother with machete

Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

PimPage: An Occasional Feature in Which I Call Attention to Books of Interest

World's 25 Most Popular Ghost Stories (of the 19th Century): T. M. Gray, Charles G. Waugh: 9781935573609: Amazon.com: Books: World's 25 Most Popular Ghost Stories (of the 19th Century) brings you twenty-five of the most popular ghost stories ever written together in this one collection. Stories by well-known authors such as Charles Dickens, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Bram Stoker, Edgar Allen Poe, and Nathaniel Hawthorne, as wells as a few not so well-known authors of today, such as Wilkie Collins, F. Marion Crawford, or Margaret Oliphant, are included in this collection. These stories are classified as the World's Most Popular Ghost Stories as they were the most frequently reprinted 19th Century ghost stories as determined by Mike Ashley and William G. Contento's The Supernatural Index: A Listing of Fantasy, Supernatural, Occult, Weird, and Horror Anthologies, 1995-, a 900-page reference work. 6x9, soft cover, 496 total pages.

Richie Havens, R. I. P.

Flavorwire: Richie Havens, the legendary folksinger whose performance of “Freedom” is one of the most iconic of the Woodstock Music & Art Fair, died this morning of a heart attack. He was 72.

Awesome Pulp Paperback Redesigns of Classic Novels

Awesome Pulp Paperback Redesigns of Classic Novels

Susan Wittig Albert Answers the Question: "Why in the world are you publishing that book yourself?"

Susan Wittig Albert answers the question: "Why in the world are you publishing that book yourself?"

I Have a Gub

9 Terrible Props Used in Bank Robberies

Bob and Ray - KeenerThan Most Persons -- David Pollock


A guest review by Art Scott.

Bob and Ray - KeenerThan Most Persons, by DavidPollock, Applause Theatre & Cinema Books, 2013, 318 pgs., $27.99, ISBN978-1-55783-830-8

            Were this a podcast, I'd be awfully tempted to do this review as an episode of Bob & Ray's Webley Webster Book Review feature.  "The Webley Webster players will now dramatize what I think is the most exciting scene in the whole book.  They're three days out to sea . . .".  But this is a blog, and the voice of Webley Webster is stilled, so I'll have to make do with text.

            Two young radio announcers/disk jockeys, recently demobbed from WWII, started kidding around and doing ad lib bits at Boston's WHDH to fill the half hour before the Red Sox games.  The show was titled Matinee with Bob and Ray, thus setting the billing, and beginning what would be a 43-year partnership of Bob Elliott and Ray Goulding, who created a unique brand of comedy based on slightly off-center characters dealing with absurd situations with deadpan seriousness.

            I am a proud, fanatical member of The Cult of Bob & Ray. For decades, B&R's radio routines have been in my ear as I relaxed at home, walked, biked and drove anywhere.  At first, the material came from the B&R tape underground, on reel-to-reel tape, then cassette, often of dubious provenance and fidelity.  More recently, many volumes of high quality transfers have come out of the B&R archives, on CD and MP3.  You can find them on Amazon.

            This new joint biography of  "the boys" by David Pollock is a valuable resource for B&R fans, for radio buffs, and for cultural historians studying the evolution of American comedy.  It covers their private lives and their career.  The personal material is simply told.  Both were home-loving family men (eleven children between them), uncomfortable with celebrity, and remarkably untainted by “showbiz” and the angst and neuroses that have been part of the personality package of so many famous funny men.

            Their career is a much more complicated story, at one time or another touching all aspects of the entertainment business, often several simultaneously.  The first few years after they left Boston and went to New York are especially crazy, as they bounced around from local radio to network shows, game shows, remotes, night club gigs and infant tv (There are YouTube clips out there from the latter; they demonstrate that their material at the time was ill suited for television, but they are wonderful samples of the raw and chaotic character of live tv in the early '50s).  The information density in this portion of the narrative is very high, and could have used a graphical timeline  to help sort things out.

            Pollock is himself a comedy writer with an impressive resume of tv hits.  As such, he is scrupulous in identifying and crediting the producers, directors, engineers, sound men and especially writers who worked behind the scenes of “The Vast Bob & Ray Organization.”  He gives due credit to writers who created so many classics bits, notably radio pioneer Ray Knight (Bob married his widow), Phil Green, and especially Tom Koch, who mailed them gem sketches from California for thirty-three years.

            As they refined their material and their reputation grew their work became a bit became more focused and less scrambled.  They had a run on NBC’s weekend Monitor, a series on Mutual, and for two years beginning in 1959 (replacing Edward R. Murrow!), Bob and Ray Present the CBS Radio Network a series of 15 minute shows that I consider the high water mark of their art.  At around the same time they had launched and developed their pioneering advertising business, Goulding-Elliott-Graybar Productions (motto:  “Puissance Without Hauteur”), best remembered for their long-running Bert & Harry cartoon ads for Piel’s Beer.

            The final third of the career arc chronicled by Pollock follows their varied activities as beloved comedy icons: their smash Two and Only show on Broadway (in July, 1971 I saw the show on tour at Stanford University, one of the most memorable experiences of my life); their association with Mad magazine, feature film appearances (most notably Norman Lear’s Cold Turkey), their many appearances on Carson, Cavett and Letterman (all huge fans), one more run on New York radio at WOR (where Wally Ballou made an abortive run for mayor), and a Last Hurrah radio series on NPR.  There’s a bittersweet cast to the last twelve years of their partnership, as – kept secret from nearly everyone – Ray was slowly dying of kidney failure, and their work had to be scheduled around his dialysis sessions.  Ray died in 1990.  Happily, Bob is still with us, having just celebrated his 90th birthday, and he, along with Liz Goulding, Ray’s widow, provided extensive information to Pollock in preparing this book.

            Throughout, Pollock supplies titles and brief descriptions of  lots of classic B&R routines, and bits of dialogue.  Fans will recognize many such, and smile as they replay the bits in their head, but they will also be frustrated to learn of many that are missing from their collections. There is so much fantastic stuff; and it must be heard.  Even the three volumes of B&R scripts that were published in the ‘70s and ‘80s are inadequate.  Their humor came from character and situation -- and brilliant voice acting – and can’t be adequately conveyed on paper (again, go look on Amazon!).  However, a book is the right medium for a biography, and Pollock has done an outstanding job.

            There are many wonderful photos, an extensive bibliography, and two indices, one general, the other an index of B&R Parodies.  I spotted only one mistake (one I suspect many Bill’s Blog readers would have noted as well).  In discussing their early tv show, Pollock mentions an actress’s previous job on Rocky Corbett, Space Cadet.  That title, of course, is a mistaken conflation of Rocky Jones, Space Ranger and Tom Corbett, Space Cadet, the latter, of course, being the inspiration for B&R’s long-running serial, Lawrence Fechtenberger, Interstellar Officer Candidate (brought to you by “chocolate cookies with white stuff in between them”).




Song of the Day

Dobie gray- drift away - YouTube:

10 Terrifying Unsolved Serial Murders

10 Terrifying Unsolved Serial Murders

Today's Vintage Ad


10 Once-Great TV Shows (And The Exact Moments They Started to Suck)

10 Once-Great TV Shows (And The Exact Moments They Started to Suck)

I Miss the Old Days

The Greatest Dead American Car Brands From The 1950s

Gator Update (Hero Edition)

Heroic father punches out alligator to save his son from the reptile's jaws 

Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.


James Duff, Some Die Young, Graphic 1956

American Cities With The Worst Health Coverage

American Cities With The Worst Health Coverage

Seepy Benton's hometown checks in at #9.  He's so proud!

5 of the worst-selling cars of all time

5 of the worst-selling cars of all time 

A History of "Trial By Ordeal"

A History of "Trial By Ordeal" 

The Most Playful Libraries in the World

The Most Playful Libraries in the World 

8 Inspiring Stories About Runners

8 Inspiring Stories About Runners

Chrissy Amphlett, R. I. P.

Divinyls singer Chrissy Amphlett dies - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation): Australian rock legend Chrissy Amphlett, best known as the singer of the Divinyls, has died in New York aged 53. 

The charismatic frontwoman was surrounded by family and friends at her home when she died this morning. 

Her husband of 14 years, former Divinyls drummer Charley Drayton, says Amphlett died of breast cancer and multiple sclerosis.

ANTS change job as they grow older

ANTS change job as they grow older, scientists discover 

Tumbleweed Trail

1942 LEE POWELL WESTERN TRAILER - YouTube:

Sunday, April 21, 2013

Luckily I'm Not a Toddler

Toddlers becoming so addicted to iPads they require therapy - Telegraph

Illegally Blonde

Reese Witherspoon ARRESTED ... You're About to Find Out Who I Am 

The Country's Top 10 Pizza Spots

The Country's Top 10 Pizza Spots

Annoying slideshow alert.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.

San Jacinto Day!

San Jacinto Day in United States: San Jacinto Day is a day of state pride for many Texans in the United States on April 21 each year. It commemorates a battle between the Texas Army and Mexican forces about 25 miles from downtown Houston, Texas, on April 21, 1836. This became known as the Battle of San Jacinto and was a turning point for Texas' independence from Mexico.

First It Was the Thin Mints Melee . . .

Father And Son Don’t Get Their Chicken Wings, Return To Restaurant With AK-47

Los Angeles Times Book Prizes

Mystery Fanfare: Los Angeles Times Book Prizes

Song of the Day

When Will I Be Loved by Linda Ronstadt 1975 - YouTube:

TV’s Most Unlikely Spin-Offs

TV’s Most Unlikely Spin-Offs

Today's Vintage Ad


First It Was the Thin Mints Melee . . .

Sun News : Season cancelled after shooting at little league game

6 Mysterious People at the Heart of Unsolvable Mysteries

6 Mysterious People at the Heart of Unsolvable Mysteries

PaperBack




Dan Gregory, Three Must Die, Graphic, 1956

Alvin, Texas, Not Included

The 20 Best Small Towns to Visit in 2013

Very annoying slideshow.

I'm Sure You'll All Agree

Top 10 TV aliens

Hat tip to Toby O'Brien.

10 Greatest Fictional Cities of Film & Literature

10 Greatest Fictional Cities of Film & Literature 

Or Maybe You Do

6 Car Companies You Might Not Realize Are 100 Years Old

5 Creepy Abandoned Rooms Found Hiding in Plain Sight

5 Creepy Abandoned Rooms Found Hiding in Plain Sight

Death Before Dishonor

Death Before Dishonor(1987) - YouTube: