As you can see on the cover of this new edition of Fools Die on Friday (1947),  Raymond Chandler wrote to Erle Stanley Gardner in 1948 and complemented him with these words: “Fools Die on Friday is about the best of the series since the first two. Perhaps since the very first.” Those words may have been premature given that the Donald Lam-Bertha Cool series has 30 books and Fools Die on Friday is only book #11.

The title comes from Erle Stanley Gardner’s observation that most executions occur on a Friday. In this case Donald Lam and Bertha Cool are hired to prevent a potential poisoning. Donald Lam decides on a tricky strategy that sounds good in theory…but fails monumentally. Lam and Cool have to scramble to limit the damage and catch the killer.

I read Fools Die on Friday back in the 1960s when I binged on both of Gardner’s series: Perry Mason and Lam-Cool. Fools Die on Friday is the sixth book of the series that Hard Case Crime has reprinted. I’m hoping they reprint the whole series! The plots are tricky and the action causes the pages to turn. GRADE: B

Since no Beatles songs were included on Classic Rock: 1965 this compilation gives a skewed picture of the music of 1965. Yes, Motown shows up strong: Wilson Pickett, Smokey Robinson and The Miracles, The Temptations, The Four Tops, and The Supremes.

Classics like The Righteous Brothers’s “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’ ” and “I Got You Babe” by Sonny and Cher rub shoulders with novelty songs like “Wooly Bully” by Sam The Sham (related to George Santos) and The Pharaohs and “Down in The Boondocks” by Billy Joe Royal.

“Help Me, Rhonda” is one of my favorite Beach Boys songs. And I never tire of listening to The Byrds’s rendition of “Mr. Tambourine Man.” Do you remember these songs from 1965? Any favorites here? GRADE: B+

TRACK LIST:

Once again I was surprised to learn about a book series I didn’t know existed. I picked up this slim paperback (105 pages of BIG PRINT!) at a Library Book Sale and learned this is the first book in a seven book series (you can check out the entire series below). Here’s the low-down from the Quick Reads website:

“Quick Reads is a literacy organisation which works with book publishers to provide low-cost, low-page count books to encourage people to read. A major focus of their outreach are adult readers who need to improve their literacy skills. BBC Books is one of the non-profit’s partners. Beginning in 2006, this relationship produced original Doctor Who fiction.

During the David Tennant years, one Tenth Doctor Quick Reads novella was released each year, including the “transition” year of 2010. No Quick Reads were issued in 2011, but the series resumed in 2012 with the Eleventh Doctor, but was discontinued after the 2013 release (though non-Doctor Who Quick Reads novellas continue to be published).

The 2007 release Made of Steel was notable for being the first piece of original fiction based upon the revival series to be written by Terrance Dicks, a script editor and writer for the original TV series, as well as a prolific writer of Doctor Who prose fiction. The novella was also published a month before the episode Smith and Jones was first broadcast, thus making it the first appearance of companion Martha Jones.”

I found I Am a Dalek a quick 20-minute read. The reading level and plot are set at a low level, but the story was typical Doctor Who stuff which always appeals to me. If you’re a Doctor Who fan, you might be interested in these Quick Reads. GRADE: B

 Billy Joel performed two concerts at Shea Stadium in New York City on July 16 and 18 of 2008. This DVD version was released on March 8, 2011. The film was produced by Jon Small, Joel’s former bandmate in the 1960s groups The Hassles and Attila. The film aired on PBS as part of Great Performances.

The two concerts were the last performed at Shea Stadium before it was demolished to make way for Citi Field. This DVD features guest appearances by Tony Bennett, Garth Brooks, John Mayer, Steven Tyler, Roger Daltrey, John Mellencamp, Mark Wood, and Paul McCartney.

Usually I’m not a fan of concert videos–many feature bad sound–but this DVD delivers crisp footage and clear sound. Worth a look and a listen. Are you a Billy Joel fan? GRADE: B+

TRACKLIST:

Philip Schultz won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry with a book called Failure. Comforts of the Abyss presents Schultz’s method of persona writing. I would call it memoir but apparently that’s an out-mode term. Here’s Schultz writing about the books that most affected him as a kid:

“…I’d go around pretending I was Jack Barnes In The Sun Also Rises and Holden Caulfield in The Catcher in the Rye, and even old Huck Finn in Adventurers of Huckleberry Finn. Their opinions and attitudes became mine and I would even try to talk and act the way I imagined they did. Which wasn’t an easy feat for a dyslexic.” (p. 1)

Schultz struggled in school because of his undiagnosed dyslexia. He thought he was dumb. Finally Schultz was diagnosed with dyslexia. He didn’t learn to read until he was 11…but he made up for lost time fast.

Much of Comforts of the Abyss chronicles Schultz’s interactions with famous writers: Philip Roth, Norman Mailer, Elizabeth Bishop, Joan Didon, etc. Those sections are buffered by the poems and poets that affected Schultz’s career as a teacher at Kalamazoo College. Schultz’s favorite contemporary poet is Elizabeth Bishop so he devotes multiple sections of this book to analyzing her work.

If you’d like to see how a poet lives his life, both ups and downs, what famous people he meets, what books and poems most affect him, Comforts of the Abyss reveals much of what made Philip Schultz a good poet. Do you read much poetry? GRADE: B

Table of Contents:

The Mind’s First Freedom 1

The Shitbird, Named and Unnamed 6

I Never Wanted to Be Me, I Don’t Think 13

Pity and Fear 23

My Two Libraries 32

The Poet and the Fiction Writer; Conduits of Revelation 48

Our Most Curious Artifact 62

Somebody Loves Us All 75

Penurious Arrogance 86

A Magic Act 98

Indian Wrestling 107

Which Side Are You On? 119

Voices Veiled and Unveiled 132

The Socratic Method 144

In the Nature of a Test 151

The Map of the World 160

Gussie 168

I Came, I Saw, I Suffered 176

In the Manner of Poetry 184

A New City of Words 193

Anger and Shame 202

The Argument and the Lullaby 211

What We Want 220

Acknowledgments 223

Credits 227

I decided to read a book by Annie Ernaux, winner of the Nobel Prize for 2022. Getting Lost, a diary from 1988 to 1990, shows Ernaux’s obsession with a married Soviet diplomat in Paris.

I confess I’m baffled by Ernaux’s obsession with this guy. Ernaux calls him “S” and he shows up at her door drunk most of the time. During sex, S talks about Stalin. S is younger than Ernaux–who is 48 at the beginning of this affair–so there’s a Mrs. Robinson and Benjamin vibe.

“11:45 P.M. He came and stayed five hours. It had been a long time since I’d experienced such perfection, and since we’d been so attuned to each other. Made love, four times, in different ways. (Bedroom, anal sex after many long and slow caresses—downstairs, sofa, missionary very tender too–bedroom, so moving: ‘I’m going to put my sperm on your belly’–the sofa, doggy style, so perfectly in tune.) An infinite need for the other’s body, his presence.” (p. 109)

And Annie Ernaux can be unintentionally funny. “I realized that I’d lost a contact lens,” Ernaux writes. “I found it on his penis.” (p. 33)

Even after a long sex session, Ernaux immediately starts fantasizing about their next encounter. From the minimal facts Ernaux reveals about her lover, he seems like a creep. Not a lot of long conversations between these two: it’s “Let’s Get It On” time whenever they’re together.

Getting Lost is a far cry from one of Deb’s romance novels. It’s almost clinical in the description of the sexual encounters.

The picture I get from reading Annie Ernaux’s diary of these years shows a woman trying to deal with the aging process by engaging in a relationship with a dubious fellow (he could be K.G.B. but Ernaux doesn’t seem to mind) like a compulsive cougar on the prowl.

Annie Ernaux refers to her son, her ex-husband, and her writing career. But, Getting Lost mostly centers around Ernaux getting lost with her Soviet sex toy. GRADE: C

Mild spoiler: Guardians of the Galaxy, Volume 3 appears to be the final chapter of this configuration of the Guardians in the Marcel Cinematic Universe. One reason is that Director James Gunn, who both wrote and directed this film (and the other two Guardians of the Galaxy movies), is now the co-CEO of DC studios over at Warner Brothers so this is his Marvel swan song.

The focus of the film is on Rocket Raccoon, the snide genius rodent voiced by Bradley Cooper. It tells Rocket’s origin story as a cruel lab experiment conducted by High Evolutionary (Chukwudi Isuji) whose quest for “Perfection” leads to a lot of death and destruction.

Chris Pratt returns as Peter Quill (aka, Star Lord) and Zoe Saldana returns in a different format as Peter’s love interest, Gamora. Like the previous two Guardians of the Galaxy movies, the music playlist fills the action with mostly songs from the 1990s and a few from the 1980s and 2000s.

Along with Drax (Dave Bautista), Groot (Vin Diesel) and Mantis (Pom Klementieff), Gunn introduces a new superhero, Adam Warlock (Will Poulter). My favorite character is Nebula (Karen Gillian) who deserves her own movie.

If you’re looking for plenty of action, wacky plotting, and irreverent humor you’ll enjoy Guardians of the Galaxy, Volume 3. GRADE: B

I fell in love with ACE Doubles at an early age in the Sixties. As I walked to school when I was 12 years old, I passed a local drug store with a prominently displayed spinner rack (remember them?) with plenty of paperbacks. But the ones that seduced me were ACE Doubles with their cool double covers in tête-bêche format. I bought Science Fiction ACE Doubles in those early days, but sometime in my late teens I broadened my buying to include ACE Doubles featuring mysteries and Westerns. I ended up donated dozens of ACE Doubles to the Special Collections at the State University at Buffalo as part of the 30,000 volume George Kelley Paperback and Pulp Fiction Collection.

Stark House just published THREE ACES, A Trio of ACE Books with a wonderful Introduction by Richard Krauss, editor and publisher of The Digest Enthusiast. Richard Krauss’s informative and enlightening description of ACE Doubles and Singles from that era highlights the editorial strategy and the changing public tastes of that time. Richard was kind enough to invite me to add some of my fond memories of ACE Doubles and they’re included in the Introduction, too!

The Gilded Hideaway (ACE Single S-107) by Peter Twist (a pseudonym of C. P. Hewitt) was published in 1955. Robert West has success and a wife and friends, but none of that brings him happiness. So West steals $100,000 and flees to Mexico to start a new Life. But West learns money doesn’t solve all problems especially when it comes to the beautiful woman named Mercedes. GRADE: B

In at the Kill by Emmett McDowell (aka, Robert Emmett McDowell) was half of ACE Double D-445 (the other half was McDowell’s Bloodline to Murder), published in 1960. In at the Kill concerns a scheme to locate some rare stamps, but leads to more valuable photos and blackmail. GRADE: B+

Heat Lightning (ACE Single S-74) by Wilene Shaw (pseudonym of Virgina M. Harrison), published in 1954, delivers a hot love triangle in the Kentucky hills. Holly Reed, while attracted to local bootlegger Brandy Elliot, finds herself drawn to a stranger in town: city-bred Larry Carter. Carter turns out to be a man of mystery…and violence. GRADE: A-

If you have three aces, you’re likely to win. Stark House’s Three Aces omnibus is a winner for sure! Don’t miss this one!

This 1980s compilation includes some artists and groups you don’t hear much of anymore. When’s the last time you heard China Crisis (other than in reference to Taiwan). Or Strange Advance?

On the flip side, there are some very well known artists and groups represented here. Love Kate Bush’s “Running Up that Hill,” Blondie’s “Call Me,” and Naked Eyes’s “Always Something There to Remind Me.”

Do you remember these songs from the Eighties? Any favorites? GRADE: B

TRACKLIST:

As a kid, I loved Greek Myths. And I read Homer when I was around 10 years old (and have reread Homer over the decades). So John Spurling’s ARCADIAN DAYS: GODS, WOMEN, AND MEN FROM GREEK MYTHS was a must-read book for me.

John Spurling is a gifted writer and captures the unique world of Greek Gods and Goddesses who influence humans. Spurling’s choice of five myths starts with Prometheus and Pandora, and continues with Jason and the sorceress Medea, Oedipus and his daughter Antigone, Achilles and his mother Thetis, and Odysseus and Penelope.

My favorite myth in ARCADIAN DAYS is Jason and his Argonauts who seek the Golden Fleece and find the assistance of Medea the sorceress brings unanticipated consequences. If you enjoy classic stories with astounding plots and colossal events, you’ll love ARCADIAN DAYS: GODS, WOMEN, AND MEN FROM GREEK MYTHS. Highly recommended! Do you have a favorite Greek Myth? GRADE: A

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

Notes — xi

Introduction — 1

PROMETHEUS AND PANDORA

1. Fat and Fire — 3
2. Wife and Gift — 11
3. Eagle and Chains — 19
4. Rain and Waves — 22

JASON AND MEDEA

1. The Man With One Sandal — 28
2. The Departure — 34
3. Lemnos, Hellespont, Arkton — 37
4. The Sea of Marmora — 42
5. The Black Sea — 49
6. Colchis — 54
7. The Return — 68
8. Corinth — 75

OEDIPUS AND ANTIGONE

1. Dragon’s Teeth — 81
2. Investigation — 86
3. Accusation — 91
4. Murder — 95
5. First Shepherd — 97
6. Second Shepard — 100
7. Punishment — 103
8. Colonos — 105
9. Seven Against Seven — 112
10. Burial — 116
11. Sophocles or Euripides?

ACHILLES AND THETIS

1. The Parents — 128
2. The Beloved Son — 131
3. The Siege of Troy — 136
4. Death and Vengeance — 154
5. A Surprise Visit — 173
6. Last Days — 178

ODYSSEUS AND PENELOPE

1. Ithaka — 187
2. Troy — 198
3. Africa — 208
4. Cyclops — 210
5. Alolia — 218
6. Laistrygones — 220
7. Circe — 221
8. Hades — 232
9. Sirens, Scylla, Charybdis — 238
10. Thrinakia — 240
11. Calypso — 245
12. Phaeacians — 253
13. Return — 267
14. Seconding — 286

Glossary of Names — 305