Friday, April 25, 2008

For All Gents My Age...

There is an in-depth podcast interview with Deborah Gibson on the Stuck in the '80s podcast at tampabay.com. The link to the podcast is on the right-hand side of the page. Or access it through your iTunes.

I won't admit to dancing with a vinyl album cover while Debbie sang "In Your Eyes" to me through the speakers, but those high school years were a big time for media-based crushes.

Wednesday, April 23, 2008

The Lasting Effect of Noir

Following on Rochester's 2007 "The Big Read" project with Dashiell Hammett's THE MALTESE FALCON, Chicago is featuring THE LONG GOODBYE, by self-proclaimed Hammett disciple Raymond Chandler in its year-long "One Book, One Chicago" program. THE OUTFIT, a blog of Chicago crime writers, has had themed posts all month, but the one that pertained to me and my life most came yesterday, written by Jim Doherty, about the legacy of Philip Marlowe, including his appearances in film noir. I encourage you to read it if you're a fan of either crime fiction or film noir.

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Bah! I got tagged!

I don't subscribe to chain letters too much (or memes, in the virtual world), but this one seems to be going around mostly to mystery writers, and I've been tagged by a friend, so I'd hate to let him down...

I first saw this at The Rap Sheet, posted by J. Kingston Pierce, who tagged Dan Wagner over at The Hungry Detective, who tagged me. It's a simple little exercise called "Page 123." What you do is this:

1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Go to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence. (A virtually useless step as the action comes next...)
4. Post the next 3 sentences
5. Tag 5 people and acknowledge who tagged you.

I am currently reading Trunk Music, by Michael Connelly. Page 123 falls in Chapter 2. I haven't actually read that far yet, so this will be as surprising to me as it is to you:

"It was Rhonda."
"Rhonda, whatever, never-the-fuck mind. She said you said he was dead."

Ooh, pretty cool. Three short sentences with conflict, vulgarity and a little staccato dialogue. I'm a late-comer to Connelly, but I'm enjoying him. Reading him chronologically, of course. God, I'm so anal.

I am going to tag local mystery author and recent Book of the Year nominee Charles Benoit at Type M for Murder, local mystery author with upcoming book LL Bartlett at Writers Plot, far-away mystery author (is Indiana far?) Trey Barker, and good friends Beavis and Spanky. (Don't ask. You'll only get answers. And that is something you do not want.)

Monday, April 14, 2008

FYI Baseball Fans

If you're looking for this year's edition of World Series Survivor, it has its own home now, at worldseriessurvivor.blogspot.com. There's also a link over on the right-hand side.