Daily Loaf

Every now and then in class, I mention “the library” and look out to see rows of blank faces. Time to explain myself again.

“It’s like the Internet, only it’s printed out,” I tell my students. “It’s this big building across campus . . . surely you’ve seen it? Has a million or so books?”

Blank stares again. “Books! You know, sort of like a blog that’s been printed out?”

There are a couple of Florida writers, longtime bloggers, whose work has now been preserved the old fashioned way: in books. It’s probably not much different than the old days when writers serialized their work in popular magazines like the Saturday Evening Post and Collier’s.

But for a semi-old fashioned guy like me, it’s so much handier – and more handsome – to tote around books, rather than carrying a laptop. Because this is the kind of writing you want to read aloud to friends and a book is a lot easier than saying, “Hey, hang on. As soon as I open my laptop and link to the network and type in the URL, I got some really funny shit for you.”

In this case, the really funny shit comes from two Florida writers, both in their early 40s, with connections to the Bay Area – Lance Carbuncle from Tampa and Patrick Hughes (at left, in his younger days) from Gainesville by way of (long ago) Tarpon Springs.

Let’s start with Hughes, because his wonderful book, Diary of Indignities (MPress Books, $14.95) has been out for some time.

It’s basically his life story, from his blog, Bad News Hughes. He’s since put that blog into hibernation and now maintains The Domesticated Shithead. The change reflects Hughes’s life, so his Diary is sort of like Pat Hughes: The Early Years. Indeed, from the cover —  a disturbing photobooth portrait of Hughes at 8 (an estimate) — we see the whole catastrophe of his life laid bare.

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Sure, it happens at the movies all the time. Somebody jumps out of the darkness with a knife and we all shudder. A whole film genre has been based on such scares. But when was the last time that happened to you while reading a book?

For me, that happened just last week, at the halfway point of The Scarecrow (Little, Brown, $27.99) by Michael Connelly. Even though you know something is up, the moment that makes you jump and do your Good-God! James Brown impression hits you with the same shock and fear that grips the novel’s hero, Jack McEvoy.

Moments like that make you appreciate what a great novelist Connelly has become. His books will still be read 75 years from now in the same way that college students are required to read Raymond Chandler and James M. Cain. Connelly leaves most of his contemporaries in the dust.

The Scarecrow doesn’t feature Connelly’s main attraction, L.A. Detective Harry Bosch, but instead focuses on newspaper reporter McEvoy, the central character in Connelly’s The Poet and a supporting character in a couple of other Connelly books.

This story grows from the freak show that is the modern newspaper business. McEvoy is a dedicated and talented veteran journalist, so he is laid off from the Los Angeles Times and forced to train his young-sprout replacement, a naïve and ambitious rookie from the University of Florida. Connelly vents a lot about what’s happened to the newspaper business — he was an LA Times star for several years before becoming a novelist — but uses that heartbreak to open the door to yet another thrilling narrative. It’s a great tale about a cast-aside reporter on the trail of a bad-ass computer-whiz serial killer. That the book also shows evidence of the immorality of big-time journalism is an added bonus.

It’s a thrilling, masterful book and it reminds us of why we love to read: we love to get caught in the web by a brilliant storyteller. Connelly lives in the area and he has a few shoutouts to Florida homies that make the book even more fun.

It seems that it was just 20 minutes ago that Connelly published his last novel, The Brass Verdict, and he’s got another one — Nine Dragons, the latest Harry Bosch novel — coming out in October. Janet Maslin of the New York Times is always a tough review, but she praised The Scarecrow, then said at the end of her review that Connelly was too prolific, that he needed to slow down. But Dude — as long as the books are this good, please … please keep them coming.

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What is it about immortal blood sucking broodaholics that makes women swoon?  Is it the danger?  Is it the biting?  Because trust me girls, I can nibble your neck and I’ve been known to walk fast with a pair of scissors in my hand.  Or perhaps it’s something unattainable to us, the meek mortal man.

Vampire stories such as Twilight and True Blood are currently the hottest things on the market from books, to film/TV and even sex toys.  What gives?  The thought of having my blood removed from the warmth of my veins does not get me wild in the pants.  But the ladies, the ladies do love their undead bad boys.  They want to be taken to the edge and peer over the side.  It drives their juices and makes their heart feel a new sense of life.  The thought that you could be laying with your lover and in the throes of passion and he could take your life must be a mighty intoxicant.  But give me a shot of tequila over a chalice of blood any day.

Edward Cullen does have quite a few more desirable qualities than say Count Dracula.  For one he doesn’t consistently look like he’s heading to the opera.  He’s a moody, anti-social, and more Abercrombie than Hot Topic.  And you’d being lying if you couldn’t admit those eyes are DREAMY. Read the rest of this entry »

Time to get caught up. As the T-shirt reminds us, “So many books, so little time.” Let’s hit the road.

AMERICA THROUGH THE WINDSHIELD: We’re all about road trips here at Creative Loafing and so imagine this: The dude who pulls up next to you at the Tastee Freeze parks a little too close. You glance at him when he gets out of the car and I’ll be damned if it isn’t the former president of the United States.

Don’t worry. W isn’t behind the wheel. This is the absolutely true story about a much-more-wonderful time when the president could move out of the White House and on to the highways.

Harry Truman’s Excellent Adventure (Chicago Review Press, $24.95) by Matthew Algeo is the thoroughly charming story of how the former president and first lady drove across country in 1953. It was for fun, not publicity. At first, you might think this book is science fiction, since the guy playing the president of the United States is so bullshit-free. But this is an all-true story.

Algeo pulls together the narrative of the trip and retraces the route in his own car. It’s part road-trip meditation and a wonderful morsel of American history. We learn all kinds of things, including that Truman was a shitty driver. He paid off the other drivers in his prolific fender benders, mostly to keep Bess Truman from chewing his ass.

Back then, ex-presidents didn’t have Secret Service protection or even a pension plan. It was, as I say, a different world. This wonderful book allows us the opportunity to get a glimpse of that America.

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Ran across on Twitter:

Best-selling author Sherrilyn Kenyon, whose Acheron sits at No. 27 on the NYT paperback list right now, says she will make an appearance in Tampa Bay:

It is confirmed. Tampa, Chicago and Philly in mid May. Dates and stores coming as soon as they’re written in stone. 7 minutes ago from web

Here’s her website.

Renowned cookbook author and Mexican cuisine authority Diana Kennedy will be at Seminole Heights’ favorite Mexican food diner — El Taconazo (affectionately known at the Taco Bus) — Friday, February 13. She’ll be signing books at 5:30 and teach a cooking class at 6:30.

I’m a huge fan of Kennedy’s. The first cookbook I ever owned was her The Art of Mexican Cooking, which is due for anew printing this March.

While she’s visiting Tampa she’ll also do a book signing at Inkwood Saturday the 14th and offer a cooking class at the Rolling Pin Kitchen in Brandon on Thursday the 12th. Her schedule is posted below.

Rene Valenzuela, owner and chef of the Taco Bus writes: Read the rest of this entry »