Blood Meridian

I just finished reading an earlier McCarthy book at the urging of my buddy Mike Besch. Mike's one of the best-read men that I know and has turned me on to many great books. After reading The Road, I delved into Blood Meridian and have to say it is a war- and terror-filled tome where Indians certainly are not portrayed with any Hollywood-stereotype nobilities. There are scenes of death and destruction that you simply have to read to believe, and given the strangely unique style McCarthy has, I doubt anyone could make it all sound so poetic. It's like poet apocalyptic scribe sat down to craft a myth based on real events of the early 1800s at the Mexican border area of the West. McCarthy draws a fair amount of criticism from all spectrums. I can't say I agree with any of it. Folks much smarter than me all have their apparently erudite opinions. All I know is that I wish I could write like this man. I thinks he's one of the rare artists of our time.
Apparently the ol' Cormanator is a very private man. You can YouTube his interview on Oprah (she picked The Road as an Oprah Book). But you'll find more on a fan site of his at:



If you want to read up a little on the characters featured in Blood Meridian, at least what I dug up, check out this link:

There Will Be Blood worth the time

I love movies, though I don't get to see them as first-run at the theaters much any more. When I do though, I usually make sure it's a film with actors whose work I respect, am entertained by, and more importantly, inspired by. So when I saw the trailer for There Will Be Blood (TWBB) with Daniel Day Lewis, I earmarked it for a trip to the show. At nearly 2 hours and 40 minutes, I eschewed all beverages and found my seat in the middle of the Star Theater in Southfield. The movie absolutely flew by, and Daniel Day's initials once again could stand for Doesn't Disappoint. The man is simply one of those actors who so immerses himself in character that you feel like a voyeur to the world he lives in at that moment. And I think he makes everyone around him even better than they are. The score by Johnny Greenwood (Radiohead) is reminiscent of John Ford, John Huston (Treasure of the Sierra Madres) and Sergio Leone movies (Spag Westerns like The man with no name trilogy, Once Upon A Time in the West, etc) where Hugo Montenegro's musical hand weighed heavily in the essence of the film. The cinematography borrows the feel of John Ford and Leone with vast landscapes and asymmetrical the film's make up and composition. There is not one false note in this film, and I can't stop thinking about it. You absolutely will be left waiting for DDL's Daniel Plainview to explode at any moment. Plaiview's not a likeable man, but he infuses the character with a driven quality that is nuanced and replete with much under-the-surface rage. I've read reviews where they claim he's bordering on bombastic, and I'm sure these critics know way more than I do about the history of film, but this guy is the real deal. He makes Brando seem as method as Ben Affleck.There's a persistent rumor that Paul Dano (playing a dual role as Paul & Eli Sunday) was a replacement for a more famous actor who couldn't take the intensity of DDL. I don't know if it's true or not, but Dano is wonderful in the role, a fine 180 in his portrayal to the bully of DDL's Daniel Plainview. I can't wait to buy the DVD of this and watch all the behind the scenes extras. Try to catch TWBB on a big screen without any distractions. It's a tremendous film.

NOTE: A much more professional, albeit at times like most critics' work, PERSNICKETY review can be read by going here:



This is a review by David Ansen of Newsweek. He was supposedly on-set and has a lot of inside info. Worth reading.

Lansing State Journal's The Hub review

Here's a nice, positive review of the book. Please note that I never stated that I needed "street smarts to survive", but hey, I guess that's creative license. Check it out if you have a moment by clicking the HEADLINE to this post.

The Road is stunning

I recently spent the weekend in Indianapolis for a swim meet that my two oldest daughters were in. Swimming, while a great sport, is replete with sitting and waiting, and then sitting some more. Because the girls are in two separate age groups, the waiting (and sitting) is made longer making it a day-long event. I sat down with the Cormac McCarthy apocalyptic tome figuring I'd slog through it. The guy's vocab is over my head most of the time, but he's got such a unique, original style. I read The Road in one sitting and plan on reading it again. It was quite simply one of the most well- and efficiently-written books I've ever read. It was stark, beautiful writing. The book presents a terrifying world view of a burned and scalded America, but there's a faint glimmer of hope laid bare. Like most of his work, (No Country For Old Men) it's no day at the beach, but it will leave you thinking about it for days. I plan on re-reading it again, it was that good. A friend told me that Cormac's probably near the end of his life, and that much of what's in there by way of themes echoes his remaining days on Earth, and the fear of death vs. living and trying to survive. He's probably right. Either way, I highly recommend it.

Eight Dogs for Christmas

I was thrilled when a friend of mine, Linda Petty, told me she wanted to buy my book as Christmas gifts for her the male members of her family. This included her father, brothers and brother-in-laws. I signed the books pre-holiday, and getting bogged down in my own Yuletide madness, forgot about it. Today Linda sent me a photo from the holidays with a very thoughtful note. Hopefully the men are still smiling after reading the book, not hoping they'd received ties or socks instead. Thanks again Linda for making my day.

Dirty Book for Sale--CHEAP!

I have to confess that at the advice of Kelly Gehart, the lovely and talented marketing specialist at my publisher, Momentum Books, I keyed on a Google Alert for my name and the title of the book. In case you've been living in Amish country, the alert can "alert" you either daily, weekly or monthly, whatever to the information you input being searched on the web. This is helpful if you're an unknown hack desperately seeking support and/or love from SOMEBODY regarding your quickly evaporating pub--or whatever your interest may be. Anyhoo, I saw an alert (it comes by email) that my book was for sale on Craigslist, which forgive me, but shouldn't there be some kind of apostrophe in that title? I was struck to see the book was being discounted to the nearly wholesale price of 15 clams, but it was the description that had me snorting java through my nose. Read on:

Eight Dogs Named Jack by Joe Borri and fourteen other storides from the Detroit streets and Michigan wilderness.
Hard cover and jacket. Excellent condition. (Was $24.95 new.) Hardly read as mother-in-law started to read it but found it was too dirty.
She said to get ride of it.
We are near the Detroit Zoo.
Thanks,

I'll tell you what, grammatical deficiency aside, this dude needs to grow a pair and tell his mother-in-law that we all didn't grow up in the pretty "zoo world" she lives in. Hey, I kid. But wow, did this make me laugh. Better hurry--at this price, smut like mine is sure to sell.

Happy 2008

I don't know about you all, but I am still living in food hangover, and in my case, all Dago food. From stuffed shells overflowing with monicatti to frutti di mare from Volare Ristorante in Wixom, I feel a tad sluggish. Slow. Lazyish, if that's a word. But I wanted to take a moment to, along with Baby 2008, wish all of you out there much prosperity, happiness and health in the new year. God bless us and the brave men and women of our country who fight to keep the USA the greatest nation on Earth.