The Million Dollar Portfolio - Who Cares?

The Motley Fool Million Dollar Portfolio: The Complete Investment Strategy that Beats the Market by David Gardner
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Inspiring but only quasi informative book about beginning in the stock market.

Definitely dedicated to those long term investors with plans of buying Dividend stocks.

Overall worth the read but not something I will be revisiting in the future.

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The Bayou Trilogy - Daniel Woodrell

The Bayou Trilogy: Under the Bright Lights, Muscle for the Wing, and The Ones You Do by Daniel Woodrell
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The book as a trilogy far exceeded the books inside the binding.

The Rene Shade story was great during the first two chapters prior to The Ones You Do chapter. The third series of the book stole my attention for two weeks. Entirely too long for the story itself to hold my interest. It came down to the fact that the first two stories, regardless of their shortcomings, were intimately readable. The third book in the story was a fabrication of what Woodrell thought made the first two books good.

We are finally introduced to Rene, Tip, and Francois Shade's father only he is much less interesting than the three brothers and their mother. He is actually not interesting at all and the only salvageable character in the novel is Rene, Tip, and Francois's new half sister Etta.

The book is a less interesting version of the first two thirds of the book which I thoroughly enjoyed.

Here is to Daniel Woodrell who is able to tell a story through character alone when everything else is screaming THIS IS UNREADABLE.

Good dialogue and good characterization can escape the rest.



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The Ones You Do - Daniel Woodrell

The Ones You Do by Daniel Woodrell
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The finale of Daniel Woodrell's finale is both better than expected and decidedly lackluster. Coming into the story anticipating another Chandleresque Rene Shade tale we are left wanting.

If you are fortunate to find 'The Ones You Do' alone you might find it a little more amicable.

But this book at the end of the "Bayou Trilogy" is definitely lacking in character observation. The people we have come to love in his earlier books are few and far between, making the book hard to get through.

Definitely not a McCarthy or Thompson or Chandleresque story.

Just a decent crime story told by a great author.


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ARE YOU THERE GOD! - Jake Swearingen

I am working on a screen adaptation of the Jake Swearingen short story Diary of the Living Dead: Are You There God? It's Me, Also a Bunch of Zombies. The story is a witty, hilarious take on the apathetic soul's tryst with the apocalypse. I hope we can keep Jake's tone and voice alive in the screen adaptation. Enjoy. I will upload the screenplay soon. yrs, mb.

Hollywood - Charles Bukowski

Hollywood by Charles Bukowski
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Ah, the misadventures of Henry Chinaski.

I must preface this review because I am a huge Chinaski, ahem Bukowski, fan. I loved Post Office, Factotum, and Woman. I really enjoyed Tales of Ordinary Madness. But I thought Hollywood was just alright. The book chronicles Bukowski's escapade through Hollywood during the making of the only screenplay he penned, the Faye Dunaway and Mickey Rourke vehicle, Barfly.

It is classic Bukowski with lots of booze and hilarious stories but this isn't the same guy. Chinaski is now married and settled and down. The excitement is gone from both the character and the prose.

It is a book I read quickly, enjoying the tell-all Hollywood tales with thinly veiled fictional names (Tom Pell is Sean Penn), but it only warranted three stars and a hint of disappointment from me.

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Farewell, My Lovely - Raymond Chandler

Farewell, My Lovely by Raymond Chandler
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Raymond Chandler's second Philip Marlowe book seems to me to be the proto-typical pulp noir fiction tale. A perfectly spun plot with a twist that seems to make so much sense but one that I didn't see coming.

This is the book THE BIG SLEEP had prepared him to write. As much as I enjoyed the first Marlowe his story breakdown wasn't nearly as thought it. Here Chandler leaves just enough clues to keep us interested while keeping us completely in the dark until the climactic finale in Mr. Marlowe's single Hollywood apartment.



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Muscle for the Wing - Daniel Woodrell

Muscle for the Wing by Daniel Woodrell
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Another sound performance from Woodrell with the (mis)adventures of Det. Rene Shade. This time though the build up feels a little more interesting/better constructed than that of its predecessor, Under the Bright Lights.

But this one falls short on the finale. The ending feels like it resolves itself to easily. Characters make decisions that seem to fall outside of the realm of their typical motivation to help our hero, Shade, escape the fate that should have happened.

All in all a fun read that, although I won't revisit too soon, I am happy I read.

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