I think most people who have been reading this site for a while know the score: When you see another book from Stark House Press, you know you are going to get your money’s worth. Stark House releases are packed with two reissues and an accompanying essay or two.
KILL THE BOSS GOOD-BY / MISSION FOR VENGEANCE from Peter Rabe is no different. These two novels share the theme of men losing something and wanting it back. The requisite bibliography kicks things off, followed by Rock Ollerman’s fascinating essay about Rabe’s work and style. It’s quite informative and I loved the Charles Willeford comparisons. My suggestion is to not read it until afterwards, because it contains minor spoilers for these two (and other) Rabe classics.
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I love a good oral history. Not only for the different viewpoints and opinions of events that happened, but all the tidbits we otherwise would never have heard about. I’m thinking of books like PLEASE KILL ME and WE”VE GOT THE NEUTRON BOMB, both of which covered the punk scenes in New York and Los Angeles, respectively.
Now, Steve Miller (not the singer) has gone one step above with DETROIT ROCK CITY by condensing five decades of the Motor City’s rock scene. Let me stress the rock aspect; there is no Motown to be found. There already are plenty of fine books about that subject.
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Time for another round of the 1970s Marvel Comics novels featuring a cavalcade of superheroes. I’d like to thank the owner of these books for letting me have the chance to finally read some of them. They definitely are a mixed bag. This time. we have the first family of Marvel, the Fantastic Four; your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man; and the big, green goliath known as the Incredible Hulk, who stomps right into action.
THE INCREDIBLE HULK: CRY OF THE BEAST by Richard S. Meyers — Why does Meyers’ name seem so familiar? Oh, I know: Because all the other books I’ve read by him were under his pen name, Wade Barker. Longtime BBB&B readers may be groaning, since Barker’s books are from the NINJA MASTER series, which truly scrapes the bottom of the barrel.
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So unique and creative is the concept behind Jeff Zwirek’s BURNING BUILDING COMIX that I’ll forgive the book’s unwieldiness. On purpose, it really can’t be read easily anywhere other than a flat surface.
The comic is unlike any other. The book unfolds into a vertical depiction of the outside of a 10-story apartment building. Open either half and you’ll see each story of the complex gets its own, well, story. You’re instructed to read starting at the ground floor and work your way up, level by level.
On that ground floor is where a miserable man attempting suicide by hanging starts a fire when he accidentally knocks over a candle. On each floor above, the blaze spreads and we watch how the various residents deal with it — or don’t.
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With the Belmont Stakes coming up June 9, animal advocate and best-selling author Rory Freedman begs readers to love all creatures great and small in “a radical new way,” in her new book, BEG, published by Running Press. The excerpt below is from the section fittingly titled “Cruelty You Can Bet On.”
When I was in college at the University of Maryland, everyone would get all jazzed up over Preakness, an annual horserace in Baltimore. No one actually cared about the race itself, they just wanted to have an opportunity to go somewhere and get drunk. When people would ask me why I wasn’t going, I’d explain that I didn’t think horses were put on this earth so I could be entertained by them or make money off of them and that Preakness, the Kentucky Derby, and all the other awful races were all the same.
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