I have to finish a big custom order for the Etsy shop today. I’m waiting out the time to get into Michaels and get a replacement part for a tool I have to use. Please enjoy the following video. I’ll…
Books/Print
Books, comics, and manga criticism, news and views at Sketchy Details
Joyce Carol Oates reads “The Knife”
by Robert • 2 August 2011 • 0 Comments
I’m a big Joyce Carol Oates fan. She is an accomplished novelists, poet, literary critic, and even banged out a great non-fiction book on boxing. Oates is arguably one of the strongest short story writers in America today. Here she…
Of Mice, Men, and Destructive Imagery
by Robert • 2 August 2011 • 0 Comments
I was in eighth grade when I first read John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men. I don’t remember particularly liking the novel because of the ending, but I found myself constantly thinking about it for a few weeks afterwards. In…
Washington Irving: All in the Details
by Robert • 26 July 2011 • 0 Comments
Washington Irving is one of those American authors who I believe is taken for granted. People know of “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” and “Rip Van Winkle.” The latter is required reading in many schools; the former, excerpted for breaks…
Vincent Price reads Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Gold Bug”
by Robert • 5 July 2011 • 0 Comments
What can make one of my favorite Edgar Allan Poe stories even better? Vincent Price reading it. I have to go take care of a bunch of business things this afternoon, but I’ll be back tonight with another meatier post.…
Zombie Romance, or, Dear Me Why Is This Stuff Real?
by Robert • 21 June 2011 • 0 Comments
I’ve tweeted photos of these books many times. I’m drawn to them for whatever reason in the slowly dwindling horror section at my local bookstore. The titles pounce out at me like lionesses on the hunt and I’m forced to…
Happy Bloomsday: A Guide to Knowing Your Ulysses Schemata
by Robert • 14 June 2011 • 0 Comments
Bloomsday is this Thursday and I couldn’t be more excited. I’ve memorized my favorite page of the novel (the early rise of Bloomusalem) and will exchange recitations with friends and strangers alike throughout the day. I’ll be rereading The Dubliners…
Presented Without Comment: Margaret Atwood Destroys Interviewer
by Robert • 7 June 2011 • 0 Comments
I’m really distracted today by a bunch of different things. Please to enjoy the most badass interview with an author of all time. Margaret Atwood tears an interviewer from the CBC apart for obviously not even reading the book she’s…
Presented Without Comment: J.J. Grandville’s Totally Steampunk Illustrations
by Robert • 24 May 2011 • 0 Comments
Presented Without Comment: Noble (Book Trailer)
by Robert • 17 May 2011 • 0 Comments
Cannonball Read III: Book 7: Budget Travel through Space and Time by Albert Goldbarth
by Robert • 3 May 2011 • 0 Comments
Albert Goldbarth’s poetry collection Budget Travel through Space and Time is one of the more cohesive collections of poetry I’ve encountered in recent years. Using history, science, and mathematics in equal measure, Goldbarth explores some of the more influential events…
Cannonball Read III: Book 6: Bespelling Jane Austen
by Robert • 26 April 2011 • 0 Comments
I’m not intentionally on a streak of monster mash lit. That this follows Classics Mutilated on my reading list is pure coincidence. The similarities between the two end at the genre. Bespelling Jane Austen is a collection of four short…
Cannonball Read III, Book 5: Classics Mutilated
by Robert • 19 April 2011 • 0 Comments
Seth Grahame-Smith, what have you wrought? In the wake of his collaborative novel with Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, many publishers have allowed other writers to slap some monsters into a classic novel and call it a new…
Cannonball Read III, Book 4: My Work Is Not Yet Done by Thomas Ligotti
by Robert • 15 March 2011 • 0 Comments
My Work Is Not Yet Done is a horror novel for people who think they don’t like horror novels. Thomas Ligotti, one of the lesser-known masters of modern weird fiction, tells a story of corporate horror that will ring plausible,…