"Baroness Sells Books" UPDATE

New year, new and improved cover for Baroness Sells Books: A Tom Lingquist Mystery, available only at Amazon:

   

              The cover to the 

   Hardcover & Paperback editions.    

    Cover to the Ebook on Kindle.

You may recall, my first attempt was to have the cover be the cover of Baroness Holly, the novel written by the unfortunate first-time author, part-time movie theater employee, Adrian Hernandez: 

The Ebook cover used a simple black-and-red design, a riff on having a character named Baroness:

    This one's for the G.I. Joe fans.

The next attempt is what I call the grainy photograph cover. It's supposed to be an image of Melody Valle, one of the characters in the book. My issue with it was that I could never get it to look sharp enough without making it more grainy. Another problem, similar to the Barones Holly gimmick cover, is that it could be confused with being erotica, rather than a private eye novel.

                 Melody Valle.

One thing that stuck around after that iteration was the design and colors I used for the titles.

         Almost there. Nice try.

And here we are. For the first time, the movie theater setting at the heart of the book gets it's turn on the cover, while the initial illustrated Baroness Holly novel-as-the-cover concept gets to stay in there. The debut of part-time movie theater employee, full-time private eye Tom Lingquist now has a cover that's a keeper. I'm sticking with this one. Once again, it's only available at Amazon

See The Movie...Or Read The Novel: "Suicide Squad"

Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice didn't have a tie-in novelization, but Suicide Squad does, written by Marv Wolfman, of Teen Titans and Crsis On Infinite Earths fame. I was impressed with his prose writing ability - I'm going to check out his novelization of Arkham Knight - and observed that it's probably (judging from the mixed reviews..or tomatoes, frankly) a smoother experience than the film, which I saw two months after reading the prose. In the past, I've tried reading other novels by comic book writers and found that only Dennis O'Neill, Devin Grayson and Alan Grant had a knack for it, whereas others felt very amateurish. If I didn't own the trade paperback of Crisis, I would've tracked down Wolfman's novelization of it, just to see how he wrote it up.

The book contains fewer Ben Affleck cameos. In it's place, the character of June Moon/The Enchantress and her storyarc in the film is elaborated on by Wolfman. In the film, June's relationship with Rick Flag, her initial transformation into the Enchantress and her enlistment to the Squad by Amanda Waller is just exposition, but it's dramatised in the book and takes up most of the first 1/3...having said that, the final battle between Enchantress and the Squad is really weak.

And I didn't enjoy reading the stuff with the EA's...the tar monsters (my description...or what I gathered that they looked like). All those descriptions of combat fighting felt like Resident Evil stuff. That was not interesting to read. I also disliked all the back-and-forth TV cop show-style bickering between Deadshot and Flag. Audiences liked Will Smith as Deadshot, so I'm assuming his performance added something missing from what reads like well-worn material. Captain Boomerang was fun to read, though the joke about why he owns the pink unicorn doll isn't in the book.

Neither the book or the film do anything with Katana, who's just along for the ride. Whatever additional scenes featuring Jared Leto that might exist on the cuttingfloor don't make it into the book, so it's hard to gauge whether even more material was shot after the book went to press...after all, the novel does have fewer Batffleck cameos...and no Flash cameo, either!

So..how do I sum this up? It has a lot of cool moments. The book does some heavy lifting with the characterization in parts, I didn't really like the plot, because it just becomes a video game along the middle, then has a really weak finale, while the casting choices impose a better movie exists along it's periphery...am I the only one who would prefer to see the newly branded DC Films ditch their labyrinthine plans for Justice League movies and just give us straight up a Batman vs. Joker & Harley Quin trilogy, instead?

Oh, and a trilogy Wonder Woman movies. Everyone loves Gal Godat. :)

Enemies & Allies by Kevin J. Anderson

Kevin J. Anderson is best known for his work writing Star Wars novels. He's quite good at writing widescreen-style epics in prose, so it was disappointing that for his first crack at a novel re-imagining the 1st meeting between Batman and Superman in the 1950's, he chose a kitchen sink approach. In one sentence, a Batman: Year One Batman meets a Superman: The Animated Series Superman to thwart Lex Luthor's attempt at a faux alien invasion to profit on arms sales.

Anderson chose an unusual storytelling structure for this book. Batman and Superman don't interact much. Chapter headings feature each hero's respective logo, allowing for the reader to opt out of reading the novel in order and read it as two separate novellas that only overlap with the last 40 pages or so. The best scenes featured subplots involving our heroes secret identities: Batman/Bruce Wayne has to investigate corporate moles among the Wayne Industries board; Superman/Clark Kent is assigned to investigate Area 51 with Jimmy Olsen, as well as fill-in as an advice columnist for the Daily Planet's romance column. These characters come alive during these passages dwelling on their personal lives and then become cipher-like once they put their costumes. Their costumed antics lacked any spectacle, which is a shame, because the 1950's issues of World's Finest Comics were purely spectacle. You kind of wish Bat-Mite and Mxyzptlk showed up. Instead, we get the world's greatest detective and the man of steel..in an adventure that's too basic to be a page-turner.

I'm not saying those old comics from the 50s were perfect - the scripts, particularly anything written by Edmond Hamilton - always felt cranked out, with no empathy, but the concepts were fantastic. Giant robots, weird monsters, time travel, space creatures and saucermen from Planet X. Apart from invasion/mad scientist stories, every 3rd or 4th story in World's Finest would be about Batman or Superman acting out-of-character, gaining/losing extra powers or adopting disguises to get one over on the other. It was daft, purely created to appeal to young children, but very persuasive. If I hadn't brought a used copy of this novel for a song, I would've considered taking it back to trade it in to cover some of the cost of that spiffy-looking omnibus edition of World's Finest that DC put out..if I hadn't checked it out at the library for free..and if could just casually throw down the bucks for that volume..I need to save up.

So, on the one hand, I don't regret reading Enemies & Allies. I just wish Anderson had eschewed earnestness and embraced the fanciful. It was probably two years too soon for that. Grant Morrison's approach to both characters was just around the corner.

The Magrs Method of Book Reporting, Book #1 - Batman: Rise of Sin Tzu by Devin Grayson and Flint Dille

Can you encapsulate the book in one sentence?

A new criminal mastermind named Sin Tzu decides that Batman must be defeated and enlists three of the Dark Knight's toughest foes to create chaos in Gotham City.

When did  you buy it?

In December of last year.  It was on the bargain table at a comic book store for two dollars.

What year or edition?

The book is a mass-market paperback novelization of a video game that was released in 2003 and is a tie-in. It is also tied to the TV series Batman: The Animated Series, which had ceased production five years prior to the release of the game.

What's your verdict?

It's "good". I thought it was clearly following an outline and the authors tried to add originality by using a mixed-narrative, i.e., every chapter narrated in the first-person by a different member of the cast, while Sin Tzu narrates four chapters. It could have been better.

How so?

There are hints/intimations that Sin Tzu could be the omnipotent asian demigod he presents himself as...or, more interestingly, is a fraud. He chose to ally himself with three Batman villains dependant on chemical stimulants/toxins: The Scarecrow with his fear gas; Bane with his Venom steroid; Clayface's entire body consists of a toxic compound called "RenuYu" (Hydromethotrexamede)...could it be that Sin Tzu's visions & powers and communications with ancient dieties are just the ravings of a drug-addled lunatic whose hideout is in (surprise, surprise) Arkham Asylum?! This could've been a great denouement for a villain who'd been all talk and no action for over 280 pages, and a nice twist for novel that took a cerebral approach to what was, if I recall correctly,  an average "button mash" melee brawler game.

Another problem: the mixed first-person narratives probably required more skill and wit at executing than what was on display - each chapter begins and ends as a long-winded monologue/soliloquy/infodump in which each narrator spends 2/3 of it mulling over their backstory, with Sin Tzu being the worst offender. It kills any attempt at creating suspense and tension, and it makes the book feel more episodic than it should be.

What genre would you say it is?

I would put it in the "Fantasy" genre, or "Pulp Fantasy", since it could've easily been an adventure with The Shadow or Doc Savage or The Spirit - characters who are often name-dropped in that realm.

What surprises did it hold - if any?

Superstar comic book artist Jim Lee created the design for Sin Tzu,  so I'm surprised the character was never used again! Also, Batman's appearances feel slight until the final two chapters, of which, the last he narrates. He should have had more to do here.

Have you read anything else by this author?
I've read Devin Grayson's Batman comics and thought they were good, but her best work was writing Catwoman. She also wrote another novel featuring the DC Comics superheroes: Inheritance, featuring Batman, Aquaman & Green Arrow, who stole the show.  I believe Grayson should get a shot at writing Green Arrow - she had a lot of fun writing him.

What will you do with this copy now?

I'll hold onto it - it's not bad at all; the few Batman prose novels I've seen have never tried juggling as many characters as this book does - it's an impressive effort.

Is it available today?

It's out of print, but it could be purchased online used..or if your comic book store has an extensive selection of paperback novels that don't "move", if you know what I mean.

What scene will stay with you? What character will stay with you?

Of the chapters narrated by the villains,  I thought Clayface's tale was the best. With the heroes, Batman's was very good. With the supporting characters (and this answers the second question), it's the strange chapter narrated by a character named Gareth Baxter, a federal agent with a curious hobby of collecting Hummel figurines...he's being interrogated by Nightwing in his bedroom, and the dialogue/narration has a subtext that Devin Grayson seems to have gotten away with...with a wink.

Give a good quote from the book

My eyes begin to adjust more completely in the dark and I can just make out the lines of his figure crouching on my seven-drawer dresser . He doesn't wear a cape, as I was told the Batman does, but his eyes are covered by a small mask that mostly serves to call attention to the bare skin of his face as a contrast against his dark hair and the rest of his entirely covered body.  Gloves.  Boots. He's a young man in his early twenties and even in the dark I can make out the long lean muscles rippling under his skin tight costume as he moves. I watched him for 10 seconds without blinking and realize that he's in almost constant motion.
"Call me Nightwing he says, his tone almost conversational. "And hand over the Sin Tzu files."

Nightwing? I shake my head . I don't remember anything about a Nightwing from the files , but he must be one of the Batman's soldiers . We'd long suspected that the Batman has a support team operating under the acronym R.O.B.I.N (Reserve Officers of the Batman's Intelligence Network) most of them alarmingly young - kidnapped children possibly, or runaways. I've also heard of an operative called The Dark Knight but never Nightwing.

-  Chapter 12, Page 238-239

A good parry. His question surprises me. It shouldn't, because, after all, he is a detective. In moments of doubt, all men rush to things they know. They flee to the familiar.

- Chapter  13, Page 261-262

My existence is spent battling for the safety of this city. I don't honestly know if it's possible to live in complete safety, complete peace . But I do know that I'll do everything within my power to bring us as close to that point as I can even if I have to use violence to do it .
I abhor violence. It is a language of tyrants and thugs and one I have therefore become fluent in, but it is never my first choice when initiating discourse.

- Chapter  14, Page 276-277