Hello, Colin. Let's see….if memory serves, this would be a non-visitation weekend, so hopefully you're booking some Campbell time, getting in a little rest and relaxation on your own.
I mentioned to you that my new job came with a pay raise, but for whatever reason it's a lot more dramatic than I thought it would be in terms of surplus cash. As a result, I went out yesterday and cautiously wasted a little money downtown, bought some DVDs and a couple of books. (I know, that doesn't sound too extravagant, but I did say "cautiously", after all.)
I'm pleased by the new movie repackaging system that's started showing up on the shelves at HMV - pairs or trios of movies that share a theme of some sort, combined in a single package. I picked up a combination pack containing the critically acclaimed
Pan's Labyrinth, which I just didn't get to while it was in commercial release, and
The Cell, a Jennifer Lopez science fiction/fantasy vehicle from 2000 that I
did see in commercial release, such are the vagaries of life.
The Cell wasn't as critically acclaimed, unfortunately - perhaps not a stellar movie in terms of plot, but very rich visually. Cost me a whopping eight dollars for the set - see above re: caution.
I also bought the special edition of
GATTACA, nice little concept SF piece, and finally laid my hands on a used wide-screen copy of
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. (I have seen so many full screen copies of that movie for sale, I was starting to wonder if a wide screen version existed…) I did a blog posting some time ago which discussed
steampunk and its lack of real penetration into the mainstream, but you know,
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen came pretty close to creating a niche for steampunk mashup. I wonder if they'll ever adapt the less approachable comic book sequel, which pits the League against H. G. Wells' Martians?
But all of that is just preamble. What I really wanted to mention was that I picked up a trade paperback of China Miéville short stories,
Looking for Jake - $17.00 at Chapters, so much for caution - and if you haven't already gotten it through
The Science Fiction Book of the Month Club, I recommend that you keep an eye out for it in regular paperback format. Which I suppose I could have done as well, but I've been coveting this particular book for some time - as witnessed by the fact that I basically read the whole thing in one sitting.
If memory serves, I introduced you to China Mieville when I was reading his
Perdido Street Station, which coincidentally also came out in Y2K. There's actually a good little piece in the collection I bought that's set in the same milieu, which discusses the fate of Jack Half-A-Prayer, the fReemade renegade whose arm has been replaced with a gigantic mantis claw.
In fact, the whole book is full of impressive bits and pieces. Some of them are a bit oblique, as with the tale of the feral streets, or viae ferae, to be technical, but as always Mieville's baroque writing style pulls the reader in and engulfs them totally. In short form, he reminds me a bit of Clive Barker - come to think of it, there's a certain resemblance in their longer works too, a sort of poetic fascination with the grotesque. But I think that Mieville has more of an urban fixation than Barker. In Mieville's stories, the sprawl of buildings and streets, alleys and walkways, is as much a character as it is a setting.
You know, I like to think that I've done well by our friendship in terms of recommending authors. Not only can I take credit for China Miéville, as far as I know I aimed you at Terry Pratchett and Iain M. Banks. But that's not intended to suggest that you're in any way behind, after all, you got me started on
Little Feat and John Hartford - looks like a tie to me.
Talk to you soon,
