Friday, January 8

Reading: Finished The League of Frightened Men a couple days ago. It's the second Nero Wolfe book (probably the 10th or 12th I've read), which means it's interesting to see how different it is stylistically from the later books. (Because of the war, there was a pretty big gap between the first two or three and the rest of the series.) Wolfe and Archie get a lot more lovable once Stout finds his stride, although the narrative voice here is still engaging, and it's cool to see space being carved out for some things we will come to count on. Mostly, what's great about this particular book is a really engaging premise--the client being not one person but a group of men who have reason to fear mortal threat from a really fascinating villain. What's startling, though not enough to put me off the book(s), is the unreconstructed attitude toward disability and people with disabilities. Paul Chapin is a villain because he's (as Archie refers to him many, many times) "a cripple," and he's suffered a crippling accident, it's suggested, because there was something wrong with him in the first place--a sort of inverted and overly intense character. Rex Stout, as progressive as he was in so many ways--and more so as the years went on and his writing spanned four decades--was not progressive in this way.

Seeing: Ryan and I are making our way through the most recent season of Lost. We dropped the thread halfway through last spring, but are picking it up now and really enjoying it.

And seeing: caught an early show of Up in the Air yesterday, which left me with no idea what all the fuss was about. After some overworked opening credits against an overworked version of "This Land is Your Land," the whole thing was thin and unsatisfying, save for one or two unexpected developments that hinted at what might have been. The two leading actors are fun to watch for their gorgeousness and charm, but Anna Kendrick, who was terrific in Camp was a one-joke attraction here.

I think it's a case where if I'd seen this out of the blue (on a plane, perhaps) without any expectations, it might have worked as a lightweight diversion. But because of its hype as a culturally significant blah blah blah, I left the theatre annoyed and baffled. That said, every year there is at least one major movie that gets tons of award attention but just leaves me cold or worse--Fargo, American Beauty, Forest Gump. To each his own, really.

I was able to read and see a ton over break and prior to rebooting this blog, but am clearly slowing down on both fronts now that I'm back at work. And working way too much already!!!