-
Follow me on:
-
Monthly Archives: March 2012
The Expats
I typically don’t read spy novels or thrillers, but I was looking for a quick read while on a trip that would be entertaining. Chris Pavone’s debut novel “Expats” was so highly recommended on its book jacket (in retrospect don’t trust these) by Patricia Cornwell, John Grisham and others that I thought surely this would be it. Grisham even compared it to the early works of Ken Follet, Frederick Forsyth and Robert Ludlum; oh, but if only this were true.
At the beginning, “Expats” is quite promising and the idea of it intriguing. A husband (Dexter) gets a new job overseas as a computer security analyst for a high-paying client, which leads his wife (Kate) to decide to quit her secret life as a CIA spy and come clean living as an expat with him in Luxembourg. She seeks to end the duplicity in their marriage from her CIA days and to become a stay-at-home mom to their two sons learning the ways of a foreign country. But life gets too boring for Kate, sitting around dreading the laundry and vacant other moms! And soon suspicions lead her back to undercover work, first in regards to a couple she senses aren’t whom they say are, and ultimately to her husband who apparently has secrets of his own. (Quite a marriage.)
The whole expat atmosphere and deceit within the marriage propel the novel and make the plot interesting. But intermixed flashbacks of Kate’s CIA past confuse and distract from the main storytelling. Also the slew of twists at the end are a turn off, as the tireless scheming (I agree here with the Times’ Janet Maslin) “exceeds all sane expectations.” And I mean that in a uncomplimentary way. It turns pretty nuts. I had to fight my way through to finish it, as it no longer seemed plausible or interesting to me. What starts out promising, spins off the rails in rapid form towards the end. Continue reading
The Hunger Games
Luckily braving the crowds of opening weekend to see “The Hunger Games” went pretty smoothly. It was being shown in four theaters in the same complex at once, and I pre-bought tickets, which was the only way to go for a seat to a film that raked in a $155 million, the third highest domestic debut of all time. People were ravenous to see the Hunger Games!
And I’m pleased to report the film does a good job of living up to much of the hype and expectations of the very popular young adult novel. It’s a grand and vivid production and hews closely to the novel’s post-apocalyptic story with a grimness that’s palpable. There’s the poverty of District 12, the oppression and inhumane lottery forced on the people by the Panem capital, and the gruesome spectacle of the annual mandatory Hunger Games, where 24 kids are expected to fight to the death.
Gracious, the plot’s levity is limited to a few comic touches from District 12’s mentors Effie and Haymitch and the bombastic Hunger Games announcer, played wonderfully by Stanley Tucci. Luckily the bludgeoning that takes place in the Games is mostly seen from shaky cameras and is somewhat indirect. Though it is still scary and disturbing (so beware of taking young kids susceptible to nightmares); poor Rue, may she rest in peace.
It’s not all gore and guts, but the Hunger Games makes a tense survival test. It follows the book well in many respects: Jennifer Lawrence makes a great Katniss, and Josh Hutcherson earns his way as Peeta. The other “tributes,” too, are efficiently menacing, and the Games (in movie and book) play out similarly on a thrilling scale. But the film skips over some of the nuances of the book, notably who is playing whom and when? Peeta’s alliance with the bad guys is a small ripple compared to it in the book, where he’s generally a more untrusted factor (remember when he trained alone?). And though both he and Katniss play-act their love interest in one another at different points to stay alive, the film misses Peeta’s disappointment in finding out Katniss’s calculated affections for him toward the end of the Games. The young romance is definitely more cloudy and nuanced in the book …
Alas, you only have to wait till November 2013 to see Part 2, “Catching Fire.” Till then: “Happy Hunger Games! And may the odds be ever in your favor.” Continue reading
Posted in Movies
Leave a comment
Rachael Yamagata at the Birchmere
Combine an awesome venue like the Birchmere with a talented songwriter with an awesome voice and you get a splendid evening. Such was the case Tuesday night with Rachael Yamagata. Her deep, sultry voice and her sad loungey-sounding songs were perfect for the intimate atmosphere of the club. She played with just two other band members in a more striped down version of her tour that is out and about backing her most recent album “Chesapeake.”
Onstage, she mixed the generally strong new material with older favorites and played especially beautiful on keyboards, lending poignancy to her often heartrending lyrics. Unsurprisingly her cover of Annie Lennox’s killer-sad song “Why” fit right in with her repertoire. The only drawback perhaps to the evening was that she had already sung earlier in the day outside at the National Cherry Blossom Festival and by the end of the Birchmere show her normally gorgeous voice was pretty whipped. Still, it was a pretty great show, so if you get a chance to see her at a small venue, don’t miss it. Here is the set list that she played on March 27:
Even If I Don’t
Why (Annie Lennox song)
Saturday Morning
Sunday Afternoon
Elephants
Starlight
Worn Me Down
Duet
Be Be Your Love
You Won’t Let Me
Dealbreaker
Meet Me by the Water
Reason Why Continue reading
Posted in Music
Leave a comment
Wrecking Ball
Leave it to Bruce to knock Adele out of the No. 1 album spot last week with “Wrecking Ball.” He is the Boss after all. Certainly the legion of his fans (including me) are listening to his latest LP, which rails heavily against fat cats and bankers for bringing down the economy and empathizes as usual with the blue-collar workingman. It’s an album that ruminates angrily about the state of the union and takes on a weightiness in about every song.
I guess first off I almost have to recuse myself from even discussing “Wrecking Ball” since I’ve been such a huge Springsteen fan since the early days with “Greetings From Asbury Park.” He is a national treasure no doubt and has so many classic, classic albums and songs. Who could ever count or measure them? He and the E Street Band are much beloved and his concerts over the years have been more than amazing.
So it’s interesting to note that the new songs have created a bit of a stir. Some such as David Fricke of Rolling Stone have given the album five out of five stars, saying it’s up with the best of his work, and yet others feel it’s heavy-handed, preachy and self-righteous and isn’t as good as many of his other efforts.
With time, the album has been growing on me. I didn’t take to the new songs immediately. For one thing, some of the album’s upbeat music seemed incongruous with its downtrodden words. The Irish/Celtic musical elements on a few songs particularly threw me. Also there was less storytelling in the songs, and I wasn’t hooked right away on the melodies. Maybe even some of his words and imagery seemed like he had used them before.
And yet the album is still good. I’m sure Bruce is held to a higher standard than mere mortals; after all we judge him by his greatness. In terms of his recent albums, I think “Wrecking Ball” compares favorably to “Magic” (2007) and “Working on a Dream” (2009), both of which I liked quite a bit, and it has the “Seeger Sessions” (2006) populist, anthemic feel to it, but it’s no “Rising” (2002) album or perhaps even “Devils & Dust” (2005), both of which I played into the ground. I give “Wrecking Ball” about 3 or 3.5 stars.
About half the songs on “Wrecking Ball” I like, and the other half not as much. Here is my list of likes:
Wrecking Ball
This Depression
Jack of All Trades
We Take Care of Our Own
Easy Money
Rocky Ground
We Are Alive
And Misfires?:
Swallowed Up
Death to My Hometown
American Land
Shackled and Drawn
You’ve Got It
Land of Hope and Dreams
Feel free to disagree and forward your complaints and list.
And if you haven’t heard Bruce’s colorful keynote speech at the South by Southwest festival, you must take a listen. Continue reading
Posted in Music
Leave a comment
The Cat’s Table
“The Cat’s Table” received considerable hype and good press when it came out this past October. Author Michael Ondaatje had won the Booker Prize for “The English Patient” in 1992 and his writing has long been revered. This novel seemed especially interesting in its premise about a 11-year-old boy’s unaccompanied three-week voyage on a ship from Sri Lanka to England in the early 1950’s. How adventurous and romantic a notion! I was definitely game for such a journey, particularly if it was based on Ondaatje’s own sea excursion when he was a boy. The book cover, too, of a large ship drew me to it like a chain hooked to an anchor. I would devour this story in no time!
Only trouble was, it didn’t exactly happen like that. In fact, I struggled in parts to stay with it and found the book took a considerable time to get through. Here I wanted to love it, and yet my mind, especially at the beginning was wandering off thinking about other things. Apparently, most readers liked the beginning of “Cat’s Table,” but some found it too disjointed toward the end. I was the opposite; I found the beginning rather hard to get into (despite the relatively easy style) but became more into it toward the end.
The start of the novel entails descriptions of various characters on the ship in short two to three page chapters. There’s the main character, Michael, and his boy pals, Cassius and Ramadhin who he runs around the ship getting into mischief with; then there’s the mishmash group of insignificants assigned with the boys to dine at the “cat’s table,” the one farthest away from the Captain’s. The details onboard are all quite charming, yet more than 100 pages into the book, I found myself grasping to find any semblance of a story. For heaven sakes move this ship along; will anything (ever) come of it?! Luckily, not long after that the waters start to churn so to speak and things become more interesting and resonant.
Thanks in part to Michael’s 17-year-old cousin Emily onboard who spicens things up and might be involved in a prisoner’s escape plans on the ship. The novel, too, opens up more in its storytelling and begins to intersperse Michael’s time on the ship with his life many years later, looking back on the trip. His nostalgia for the journey and how it affected him is quite poignant and pivotal to his coming of age. Years later, he ends up marrying Ramadhin’s sister and reconnects to other passengers, including the semi-mysterious Emily.
The novel is quite a subtle and intimate read, if you’re looking for a lot of action and adventure, this might not be your cup of tea. Yet it snuck up on me in due time. By the end, I could feel the weight of its voyage and how it altered Michael and others sitting at the ship’s cat’s table. For more info, check out author Michael Ondaatje being interviewed about the book on PBS. Continue reading
Posted in Books
2 Comments
The Latest Albums by Sinead O’Connor & Kathleen Edwards
It’s quite nice now that Academy Award season is officially over and the hoopla can die down. Along with Valentine’s Day and the Super Bowl, February is now safely in the rearview mirror. Even Uggie (at left) seems relieved; as well he should be after “The Artist,” which he starred in, took home gold.
I’ve been enjoying two albums that came out recently. Have you heard the latest LP by Sinead O’Connor, “How About I Be Me (And You Be You)?”? Wow, she still seemingly has the voice and power of her former days. I’ve been a delinquent fan of her music and haven’t listened to much of it since her very first albums, “The Lion and the Cobra” (1987) and “I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got” (1989), which I must have played completely into the ground on my Sony Walkman back then. Though I also remember her “Universal Mother” (1994) album fondly with “Fire on Babylon” and a cover of Kurt Cobain’s “All Apologies.”
It’s good to see the Irish singer back, with an album that’s reminiscent of those remarkable early days. She was just 21 back during “The Lion and Cobra” and now she’s 45. Obviously much has been made of her life, struggles and outspoken statements over the years, which I can’t say I’ve followed closely. No doubt, she seems to bring a lot of it on herself but also at times receives a bad rap for following her heart, conscience and spirituality. Can’t blame her much for that. But one can dig the music on this recording without being born again or caring much about her personal life on the Twitter-sphere.
Some of the tracks on “How About I Be Me” are quite uplifting; she sounds happy; others are blunt with indignation. Favorite tracks on the album include: “The Wolf Is Getting Married,” “Reason With Me,” “4th and Vine,” “Old Lady” and “Queen of Denmark.” Check them out.
Perhaps on the flip side of that is an album I’ve been listening to by Canadian Kathleen Edwards, now 33, called “Voyageur.” Man, it’s smooth. It sounds a bit of a departure and more polished than her more country-roots-sounding albums “Failer” (1999) and “Back to Me” (2005). “Voyageur” is a journey through one troubled relationship; apparently Edwards began recording the album just months before her divorce from her musician-husband. She lays it down on the album, sounding open and vulnerable. The upbeat, opening track is especially good as she sings “I’m moving to America, moving to America, moving to America, It’s an Empty Threat.” Other favorite songs on “Voyageur” include “Mint,” “Change the Sheets” and “Chameleon/Comedian.” It’s an album that’s too good to miss. Continue reading
Posted in Music
Leave a comment
