Dark, funny, sharply-observed
920914
When hapless Dickie Straight leaves his dreary, dead-end small town in Oklahoma to make a new life for himself in San Francisco, he ends up in the seamy Tenderloin neighborhood with the homeless and the hipsters. DS goes through waves of culture shock, and takes the reader along for the ride. In general, I only enjoy satire small doses,because too often it comes across as cold or condescending. This book is different. There's a lot of dark humor in #Tweeting The TL, but also warmth and compassion. I live in San Francisco, and it's clear the author really knows this city -- and loves it, despite (or because of?) all the colorful, crazy, contradictions of life here  #Tweeting The TL -- I rate it 3 boilermakers and a double shot of Fernet. Cheers! :-D
1213839
Wow!  Adrian McKinty's "Dead I Well May Be" is a blistering rogue of a novel; an intelligently savage tale as melancholy as it is brutal - a fatalistic tour through upper Manhattan's mean streets which are pale and gentle against a Mexican prison's brand of hard-time.

Michael Forsythe flees native Ireland reluctantly but just ahead of the law to work for Darkie White, head of the Irish mob controlling the drug flow in one of Harlem's burned out hoods in the Wild West Days of David Dinkin's New York.  Michael has not yet turned 20, but he already has a lifetime behind him: a failed stint in the Army and veteran of Belfast's "Troubles", young Michael finds himself strangely at ease meting out violence to transgressors without discrimination to creed, race, or religion, while finding enough time for hard drinking and loose women.  But what could have been just another simple - if well told - tale of drugs and drug runners shooting each other up in the city takes a furiously unexpected turn down a desperate path of betrayal, survival, and  vengeance in an Odyssey-like journey that has the reader hanging on by the fingernails as McGinty lurches through twists and corners, each more shocking than the last.  Where Homer's Odysseus faces Scylla and Charybdis, young Michael has Dominicans and sadistic prison guards to deal with; Homer's Sirens are Micheal's Bridget, Darky's irresistible moll who launches Michael's voyage into Hell.  True to the fabled warrior-poets, McKinty's pen spins, despite the viciousness of the storyline, achingly beautiful prose.  Michael's fever-fed, hallucinogenic escape through the hurricane is poetry as a raw, open wound. But this is hardly Homer - it is much more readable and infinitely more disturbing - the kind of stuff the IRA likely reads for bedtime stories.

In young Michael Forsythe, McKinty creates the likable, flawed hero -  self educated and deeply literate, wisdom honed by days and nights on the streets - the learned thug who brings "War and Peace" - in audio form - with him on a stake out.  Masterful foreshadowing leads the way but only makes the anticipation greater, and while the climax comes as no surprise, the redemption is no less satisfying.

Part Cormac McCarthy, part Ken Bruen, with a hint of Charlie Huston and Dennis Lehane, Adrian McKinty is the most talented author I've never noticed - till now.  This is powerful fiction - unrepentant and unapologetic - and certainly not for the easily offended or feint of heart.  For me, can't wait to dive into the next two installments of the Michael Forsythe trilogy.  Bravo, Mr. McKinty!
3408933
The debut effort from Snubnose Press, a six short story collection called Speedloader, is packed full of dark material.

I hear you already: "Of course it's dark, Rhatigan. It's noir. That's French for black, moron."

And I hear that. But trust me--this is noir burned to a crisp.

Particularly W.D. County's Plastic Soldiers, which has received special attention in nearly every review I've read. For good reason, too. This is an unflinching look inside a child-rape factory through the eyes of one boy. It's riveting material and County uses the boy's toy soldiers to great effect.

Nigel Bird has a gem in here as well in You Dirty Rat, an unconventional revenge tale set during WWI. Bird has quickly gained a reputation for crafting emotionally complex and thoughtful work with fully developed characters, and this story highlights his strengths.

I've seen a lot of Richard Thomas lately (Shotgun Honey, Dirty Noir). He delivers here with the seriously depressing Herniated Roots. A recovering alcoholic finds a girl who proves to be his true love. Or the cause of his slow death. Something like that. The message that "You're screwed!" comes through loud and clear and brilliant. The character's meandering yet inevitable demise proves to be (somehow) very satisfying.
1993522
This is a great dark comedy that taps into our wishful thoughts when you see  unreal "reality" tv or shock commentators. It is a testimonial of our times where "rude", "loud" or "outrageous" is the way to fame, instead of personality, talent and substance.
2948214
It's remarkable the way this writer manages to wring some hilariously funny scenes out of some very dark material and some very twisted characters (though the regular ensemble characters are the most engaging bunch of people I have come across). This book kept me up all night waiting to see what happened next. I found it an amazing mixture of horror, enchantment, pathos, suspense and hilarity. The ending is a wow.
4051415
Jenny Green has had a horrid sophomore year. After some humiliating internet blog posts and being dumped for another girl, she begs her father to send her to boarding school in Canada where she hopes to make a fresh start. But then she gets spurned by one guy too many, prompting her to go on a killing spree to exact revenge.

Jenny Green's Killer Junior Year is a startling book. The basic principle of the novel--killing ex-boyfriends for revenge--is handled with a cavalier attitude, but instead of being amusing, it is troubling. The book is full of humor as Jenny makes light of the lavish and ridiculous lifestyles she and her friends live, but overall, the book really isn't too funny when you think about it. Jenny is a very three dimensional character and Belasen and Osborn do an excellent job and crafting an appropriately complicated plot, but many readers may not appreciate the dark message it sends. Instead of being darkly funny, Jenny is disturbing and the way she gets away with everything is disconcerting.
3471299
This graphic autobiography is a collection of David Heatley's comics that are darkly and explicitly funny. He leaves very little to the imagination as he takes us through his sex life (and eventually his love life), his relationships, good and bad, with people of other races, and his relationship with his parents and family.

As an autobiography, the book gives us rare insight into the feelings and experience of another human being. It doesn't hold anything back, and doesn't let us as readers, either. You might put the book down in disgust after the first couple of pages, or read in mesmerized fascination as David alternately destroys and rebuilds his life. In neither case, will you be entirely comfortable. That is good. What David does brilliantly here is hold up the weakness and frailty of the human condition, then show us that it is possible to overcome it to be something more than what we were.

The book is graphic in more than one sense. It is as much about the drawings as the text. They are simple but effective, but in many cases the subject matter is very sexually graphic-about what you would expect in a book in which one section is titled "Sex." He draws his characters as real human beings with or without their clothes. This is one comic book that you don't leave out for the children to see.

As I read through My Brain Is Hanging Upside Down, a theme emerged of needing to ask ourselves the tough questions. What is sex? What is love? Why are they different? Am I a racist? Do I really know my Mom or Dad, or even myself?

For those with an open mind, this book will help you ask these questions of yourself.

Armchair Interviews says: Thought-provoking read.
3016348
This is a dark, dark comedy.  Or maybe it's a really funny tragedy.  At any rate, it is clear that the author is familiar with medieval Scandinavian literature, because the "Voyage" is reminiscent of the extant literature of the period: blood soaked, sardonic, morally ambiguous.  I was pleasantly surprised at how good this book is.
3455608
This is a dark comedy Western, which delves into the lives and adventures of two gun-slinging brothers, through the point of view of the kinder, more sensitive of the two. At times, it is extremely violent, and some graphic trials and tribulations befall the brothers. It appeared to be well-researched, and had a sense of authenticity in terms of the history of the gold rush, and frontier life. As a person who loves animals, I was disturbed by some of the writing. The author takes on big themes, with candor, irony and outrageous humor, and his images are original and at times poetic and brilliant. The dialog had a very life-like feeling, and the pacing of the novel keep up my interest, taking me through the perils and at time horror involved. Even though this was disturbing to read at times, I am looking forward to more work by this writer, since he is extremely fresh and talented.
256803
Author E Ballz has apparently dissected life very carefully. He has some wonderfully amusing insights, as well as some pretty harsh criticisms. This book almost seems to defy genre classification. It's a rare blend of psychological advice, social inquiry, and the like. I'm happy to have read something so fresh and so unrelenting. Although I wonder if the average person will 'get it'...
3854747
I'd forgotten how funny these books are.  Just the rundown of the girls working for Sonchai and his mom is worth the price. And the great east/west comparison, talking about how murder is normal, but dissecting the act of, say, flaying, psychologically, as only being capable of coming from a Western mind. Morbid, dark, and hilarious.
The trouble with a sequel, especially a sequel to this book is maintaining great things from the first that people would then come to expect.  So, the humor--check!  I did hope there would be more revelations of self, but, so many of the characters were repeats, that you can't ask for everything.
I hope that these books don't misrepresent a slice of Thai culture, but I really enjoy how it is all presented.  John Burdett again lays it all out without preamble, letting things simply transpire, and doesn't forcefeed you any leads, red herring or hooks.  You are left to simply enjoy the story instead of putting down the book, thinking too hard, and going back to pages to hunt and peck for the most recent clue.  To me a mystery novel is that--a novel to be read, and not a 300-page word search looking for the answers before the end.  That's what a re-read is for.
It's easy, as an American, to accept the original reason behind the murder at the center of the book, but, towards the end, when it is revealed why the man was murdered , and the "matter-of-fact"ness of it, is something more tragic and petty than even the most paranoid FARANG mind can conjure.
When all is revealed, the importance of, not good evil, but balance and karma is again emphasized as in the first book, and the plot is satisfyingly concluded.  My biggest criticism is that, someone, the voice of this novel wasn't the same fun-loving and spiritual tone as the first book.  This one was more bitter, cynical, and critical of others, in comparison to Sonchai's former acceptance. His keen analysis turned more into judgments, and, while a good book in and of itself, will leave readers wondering what happened in between one and two.
4005305
Atkinson's style is immediate,conversational, spiky, coarse and funny. One would like to meet her, share a pint, see
what happens ( but not want to break up with her unless one would relish being a spectacle carcass).
It's interesting to compare her photo on the back of this book where she looks to be a pleasant, fresh-faced woman with an easy smile, to the photo on the Poetry International website where that face, thinned and a little lined, looks out with sardonic eyes. Especially that raised right brow which would seem to be an effective commentator on the foibles of women and men. That photo provides the clearer image.

"Photo from Belfast" recounts her meeting with the " dead boy, Michael". His accent and smile find them sharing a pint and having a memorable conversation. They take each others picture on the Queens Road and then we are given
this detail:

"The car was a chunk of dark, behind and to his right.
Blue, maybe black, dead shiny. I'd a new pair of jeans on
and clocked my shape it is panels on the way in."

The 2nd stanza explains that she left the pub and Michael for a " pair of spike-heals  I'd taken a shine to a while back." The car where she has viewed her own image earlier, explodes making " light of the pub and creating a riptide of splinters". During the terrorist explosion she was:

"... three blocks east
with his number tucked in my backside pocket
and my heart set on a pair of ****-me shoes."

It's a feature of Atkinson's style that her language refers to itself as it grapples with the enormity of what happened to Michael: the car was a "chunk of dark" but the explosion makes "light of the pub",the car is "dead shiny" and she leaves the pub in pursuit of a pair of spiked heels " she took a shine to " a while back ( her shine saves her life while the other shine takes Michael's ); she refers to their flirty coversation as being in " full-flash " in the first stanza and the car in the 2nd stanza "puts a root of white heat through the tarmac." This layering establishes how Atkinson will present and examine questions of identity.

The third stanza brings the issue of how we see ourselves and others into clearer focus. The comment is both common and revelatory: the explosion " has a way of shifting your focus  making you re-think your image."  It seems that they found Michael's camera which had footage of their earlier, flirtatious picture taking. The poem examines a transformational moment when the poet, acutely aware of what her self-image has done for her, decides to refocus in order to bring the image of Michael " back to light " :

"I develop him
nightly from the reeling dark--each particular fluke
of space, time, matter. You'd not think it difficult
to filter him down to light through the pinhole of morning
to bring him back to light, to get the picture."

Clearly, morning has its homonym.
And the colloquial phrase " to get the picture" has been buffed: we know that those who "turned up his camera" literally got the pictures. One type of getting. The  poet is going for another type of getting: understanding and commemoration. Atkinson's comment " You'd think it not difficult " acknowledges that she has learned to be careful
in her re-composition, in her poetry. She has refocused: she can create.

There is no reason to " keep schtum " about her poems. She is capable of irony, invective, clear observation and street talk. All commendable abilities.

"Then Everything was Axes" is a funny poem about a misplaced axe on a camping trip which ends in a striking pun;
"Dad Dowsing " is a wry poem about the mutual adulthood of the poet and her father; " Persistent Cough "
examines an ailment the doctors can't account for and ends with the determination that the " outside moves in me ."

Atkinson has clearly found much in that outside which she uses to move us in turn.
3801004
VOICES FROM THE OTHER SIDE, edited by Brandon Massey, is a collection of short stories from many authors. In Eric Jerome Dickey's "Harlem," which is both scary and laugh-out-loud funny in places, an inmate in an asylum makes friends with one of his nurses and gets way too involved with her, seducing her and finally making a date with her. Brandon Massey's story, "Deadwoods," involves a huge tree that suddenly pops up in the yard of an unemployed suburbanite. What can he do to get rid of this evil smelling tree that harbors something frightening among its leaves? Brian Egeston's "Smoked Butt" is the story of a little girl delivering food to shut-ins. She has to travel through deep woods and her adventures are awesome and screamingly funny. In "Good 'Nough to Eat," Rickey Windell George, has an unemployed man seeking work wherever he can find it. Dancing in a male revue in a club is not his idea of a good job but it's all he can find. This tale has a shocking ending that will leave you gasping.

All the stories in the book were very good, each with its own shock value. Brandon Massey has put together a collection of stories - some funny, some horrifying - but all of them hold your interest and you find yourself wondering, as you read each one, how this particular one can possibly turn out. To the credit of the many writers, the end is always unexpected and sometimes downright zany. The writing style of Tananarive Due's "Upstairs" is reminiscent of Joplin's Ghost, while Terrence Taylor's "The Share" is heart wrenchingly realistic in a totally abnormal way. Maurice Broaddus, with his "Black Frontiers" brings us a taste of our lost history, along with Christopher Chambers' "Leviathan," a smooth reading but frightening story about the Middle Passage. It is a book worth reading if you like looking over your shoulder or peering into dark corners.

Reviewed by Alice Holman

of The RAWSISTAZ Reviewers
4551527
Ah the sardonic wit of it all. In his new book "Get Laid or Die Trying: The Field Reports," author Jeff Allen promises a darkly comic yet poignant retelling of his history as a dateless peon to an almost superhero-like character with legendary powers of seduction; the likes of which women are unable to resist. He promises fun, entertainment, and thought provoking text. Readers believe me; Mr. Allen faithfully delivers on his promise.

Allen takes the reader from his humble beginnings as an inwardly angry youth, due to reasons which will be left for one to read about, and paints a picture of an out of control master of social mayhem searching for peace in a chaotic world. The book begins with Allen relating a story of being struck in the face by an irate homeless man on the streets of San Francisco. With stories like these who needs reality television?

The unique aspect of the work is that Allen's stories are all related through so-called "field reports", a series of primitive electronic journal postings which he accumulated while being a part of an underground internet seduction community. It is his experiences within this seduction community which propel him from romantic bottom feeder to international playboy.

As one reads each report one by one, they are able to get an almost tangible feel for the man on the journey. They initially meet a disenfranchised child of bad circumstances who is seeking an oasis in the sea of emotional pain he feels as an outsider in a judgmental world. From there they watch as he grows in confidence and spirit and eventually emerges triumphant.

Be warned, the stories are not for the faint of heart because mostly they will leave one laughing until they are clutching at the chest begging for air. Allen brings a no holds barred wit and propensity for blunt speech to stories which, while seemingly fantastical and absurd, he swears to be true. He introduces us to colorful characters such as "Cripsy" and "Chessy" and his tales of alcohol induced tom foolery are almost delicious in their anarchy.

While some may become Tucker Max nostalgic while reading this work, the difference is as clear as a full moon on a cloudless night. The reader really begins to understand the man who is writing these "reports" and sees through his eyes what drives him. The reader is privy to his inner thoughts and demons and even though at times Allen may seem cold and calculated, he never loses his humanity and thus transcends the frat-boy genre and tugs at our emotional heartstrings.

The book itself is also not just another shallow journal of beer drinking and one night stands. The final "report" of the book is full of promise at a better tomorrow. Allen not only writes of how he became a master of seduction, but also of how he became the master of his own destiny. Through the journey he comes to many realizations which lead him down roads of reform and redemption. By the end of the read he is inspired and inspiring, hoping to lead others toward a place where they too may feel fully confident in who they are and what they may become.

Needless to say, "Get Laid or Die Trying: The Field Reports" is a lighthearted romp down a slightly crude and hazy memory lane. Yet while this is true, it is also the story of a man realized. It is a story of the journey from boyhood to manhood. One actually finds themselves pausing and quietly reflecting as the last sentence of the work lingers in their mind. The reader has a feeling that maybe they too have yet to realize the true scope of what they are capable of and it is possible that from that day forward they will be able to see what can be rather than what is.
2168446
Brett Selmont's brreak out novel is dark-very dark-but the evident humor and social satire makes the book thought provoking-and the provocation of thought is why I read. Anyone unfamiliar with Selmont will read and wonder. I gave it five stars and intend to make it book to read next month in our reading club.
308546
I don't read graphic novels on a regular basis, but I really should.  I was that kid who held onto picture book reading far past the time my peers gave it up.  Im not saying I didn't like chunky novels  I was reading those too.  But I leafed through the latest picture books in the childrens section and then went and grabbed a stack of Nancy Drew or Hardy Boy novels in the same library visit. Now, when I pick up a graphic novel, Im always pleased  I read it quickly and then go back and pore over the illustrations and let it all sink in.  Danica Novgorodoffs The Undertaking of Lily Chen caught my attention with its delightfully dark cover art and unusual title.  I thoroughly enjoyed it.

In parts of rural China, an old tradition of ghost marriages still persists. There are those who say that a man who dies unmarried cannot be happy in the afterlife unless his body is married to a female corpse and buried with her.  When Deshis brother dies in an accident, his parents demand that he locate a ghost bride before the day of his brothers funeral.  Deshis journey into the countryside to find a body is filled with a little too much adventure, and when he encounters Lily, a girl whose only aim is to flee her dead-end life, he wonders if hes found a solution (for at least one of his problems).

Novgorodoffs graphic novel is a morbidly funny book with a unique setting, a feisty heroine, and a backstory that delves into unfamiliar folk beliefs and stretches the imagination.  Deshis task is by turns tragic and comic, and his general flailing (and failing) at life, though a well-trodden storyline in adult lit, is revived in the uncommon setting.  Nevertheless, Lily and her family are the highlight of the book. The Chens simple life and unsubtle reactions paired with the delicacy of watercolors make for a striking combination.

Speaking of the art the palette is neutral, movement mostly implied, and the best part (in my opinion) are the landscape panels.  In all, The Undertaking of Lily Chen is an easy read with an understated art style that compliments the dark, wry humor.

Recommended for: fans of Neil Gaiman and those who like dark fiction and adult-level graphic novels.
3827623
Miranda July is a twisted genius. She sees commonplace aspects of life in bizarre and insightful ways, sharing them with you in a way that provokes a number of often-conflicting feelings. She writes about dark things---pedophilia, loneliness, infant mortality, unrequited love---but she does it in such a novel way that you often find yourself laughing in delight all the while your heart is hurting for the characters. It's an impressive act, to make one feel so many things at once.

This story, about a lonely, eccentric woman looking for purpose and connection in her life is both hopeful and tragic. July has a sly way of making this character endearing to us, one quirk at a time.

I found this book nearly impossible to put down. I laughed out loud frequently, and occasionally felt as though I had been gut-punched. July's prose is extremely evocative.

One day, I'd really like to meet Miranda July and have a substantial conversation. I suspect that I wouldn't much understand her, nor she me---I think her brain works in orthogonal manner to most others---but it would be a delight just to hear the unfiltered her.