Mini-Review: Sick Puppy

I read Sick Puppy, by Carl Hiaasen, last year but never got around to reviewing it. I picked this copy up through BookCrossing; it was a wild release I found in a used book store. The plot is classic Hiaasen: Twilly Spree is a well-off environmentalist who decides to teach a litterbug a lesson. He ends up kidnapping the litterbug's dog and blackmailing him to keep an island off the coast of Florida from being developed. There are tons of other crazy characters, of course, and a lot of political intrigue and wacky high jinks. I found this book immensely entertaining; it was my first adult Hiaasen novel, and it definitely won't be my last. I loved the character of Twilly because he's such a contradiction: a rich hippie with a heart of gold...and anger management issues. Highly recommended reading for anyone who's ever had an urge to give a litterbug a piece of their mind.

Weekly Geeks #25: Holiday Gift-Giving Guide

This week's WG challenge: a books-based Weekly Geeks Gift Giving Guide!

1. Think about the books that you and people in your life love. It’s best to use more obscure books, because we’ve all heard plenty about the more popular ones.

2. Come up with categories, based on relationship, personality, or whatever else you like. I think this is easier to do once you have your books in mind; you can then just assign categories to those books.

3. Post your own gift giving guide! Add short blurbs about the books, just enough so that your readers can determine if it’d be a good gift for people on their list. Don’t forget to come back and sign Mr Linky.

4. Visit other Weekly Geeks, and if you like their guides, maybe add links to the bottom of your own.

I know it's late, but I was really excited about this WG theme and wanted to share my ideas. Here goes...

For that friend who made sure you were registered to vote and then pestered you endlessly about how great Obama is:
Anything by Christopher Buckley. The man is a genius at Washington satire. His most famous novel is undoubtedly Thank You For Smoking, which was made into a pretty awesome movie starring Aaron Eckhart (pre-Batman). He has plenty of other great books, too.

In Boomsday, Washington spin doctor and nighttime blogger Cassandra Devine comes up with an unusual way to help defray health care costs. Supreme Courtship, Buckley's newest novel, has a reality show judge being appointed to the Supreme Court. Little Green Men examines what happens when a Beltway insider finds himself abducted by aliens. And for the feminist, Florence of Arabia, in which the youngest wife of an Arabian prince decides to use TV to help women all over the Middle East gain their freedom and independence. Optional: print out a few pages of The HuffPo and use them as gift wrap.

For the reluctant reader:
The 39 Clues #1: The Maze of Bones, #2: One False Note (available for pre-order; it comes out next week), and Card Pack #1

This is a pretty smart idea. The 39 Clues is a mystery series about Dan and Amy Cahill, siblings who have been chosen to find the Cahill fortune. But they're not alone! Several different descendants are also on the trail, and readers can play along. Each book (there will be 10 in the series) comes with 6 collectible trading cards (350 are available in all) which can be registered on The 39 Clues website to help unlock puzzles, games, and more clues. There are special prizes for each country, so no one has an advantage. There are also Card Packs, which have 16 random cards (there are 56 total in this first series), including at least one rare or ultra-rare in each pack. Sounds confusing? Your Pokemon- or Naruto-obsessed son/little brother will understand, and have a field day with it.

For the Jimmy Buffet fan/environmentalist:

I've sung the praises of Carl Hiaasen before, and I'm going to do it again. The man is funny, and his love for Florida is evident in his novels. His YA novels (Hoot, Flush, and the soon-to-be-released Scat) are perfect for middle schoolers, and there's sure to be something in his other novels for the adults in your life. If you live in the UK and enjoy musical theater, why not buy a copy of Lucky You and include tickets to the show as a bookmark? Actually, a great way to package any of these would be to get a metal bucket and stuff it with one of the books, a copy of Songs You Know By Heart, and a few Coronas. Your beach bum friends will thank you.


For the comic book lover:
Everyone loves Fables, but there's another Vertigo comic that's equally amazing: Y: The Last Man. In the near future, a plague kills off every animal on earth with a Y chromosome. Yorrick Brown, English major and amateur magician, is the only male on the planet to survive, along with helper-monkey-in-training Ampersand. The books follow his adventures to find his missing fiance and to discover how he survived the plague.

Other graphic novels: Watchmen (read it before you see the movie!), or, for those who are already fans, Watching the Watchmen. Fans of Neil Gaiman's Sandman series will get a kick out of The Little Endless Storybook, The Dead Boy Detectives, or Death: At Death's Door.

Some other random ideas:
My family is making gifts this year. I've bought a few books for gifts, but the majority of my shopping will be spent finding supplies for these:
Cake in a Mug - put all the dry ingredients in a plastic baggie, include the instructions, and gift it with a thrift store mug. Instant yum!

If you're crafty, Lion Brand Yarn has some really cute amigurumi patterns up on its site. I made this penguin for a friend of mine in no time. There are tons of other free amigurumi patterns available, plus projects for kids and ideas for pets.

I'm also a big fan of mixtapes - er, mixCDs now, I guess. My Secret Santa gifts this year will include my awesome holiday mix, which features Christmas songs by Atlanta area bands. A good place to find music is last.fm: search for the type of music you want, and it lets you listen to full-length songs. It also has some some free mp3 downloads, which is nice. Sign up for an account, and it learns your musical taste and starts recommending stuff to you. Pretty sweet.

Weekly Geeks #24: All About Carl

This week's WG challenge: fun facts about authors!

How to:

1. Choose a writer you like.

2. Using resources such as Wikipedia, the author’s website, whatever you can find, make a list of interesting facts about the author.

3. Post your fun facts list in your blog, maybe with a photo of the writer, a collage of his or her books, whatever you want.

4. Come sign the Mr Linky below with the url to your fun facts post.

5. As you run into (or deliberately seek out) other Weekly Geeks’ lists, add links to your post for authors you like or authors you think your readers are interested in.

I picked Carl Hiaasen.
I was introduced to him last year, when the 7th grade class in which I was student teaching read Hoot. It was pretty much love at first page. So far, I've only read his two YA novels (Hoot and Flush), but I acquired a copy of Sick Puppy thanks to BookCrossing and have added it to my continuously growing TBR pile. Fun facts about Hiaasen:

1. He was born and raised in Florida, and writes regularly for the Miami Herald. Florida has been the setting for the majority of his novels.

2. His books include:
* 12 fiction novels (one of which was a collaboration with 13 other authors)
* 4 non-fiction novels
* 3 YA novels (Scat is available for preorder now!)
* one short story, "Tart of Darkness," which was published in an issue of Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition
* 3 novels co-written with fellow journalist Bill Montalbano inspired by their own reporting experiences
* 2 collections of his Miami Herald columns. Whew!

3. Although his novels are usually filed as "Mystery/Thriller," they generally deal with the environment and Big Business trying to destroy the natural beauty of Florida. As Wikipedia puts it, "Hiaasen's Florida is a hive of greedy businessmen, corrupt politicians, dumb blondes, apathetic retirees, intellectually challenged tourists, hard-luck redneck cooters, and militant ecoteurs. It is the same Florida of John D. MacDonald and Travis McGee, but aged another 20 years and viewed with a more satiric or sardonic eye."

4. Two of Hiaasen's books have been made into movies: Hoot and, amazingly, Striptease. I wish I were kidding.



(I would have a Striptease trailer here, just for comparison's sake, but searching "Demi Moore Striptease trailer" in YouTube is surprisingly unhelpful.)

5. Another one of his novels, Lucky You, has been made into a play with music by Loudon Wainwright III, father of Rufus and frequent Judd Apatow collaborator:



Other authors from my fellow Weekly Geeks:
Christopher Moore by Ali
Neil Gaiman by Softdrink
Sarah Dessen by alisonwonderland
Anne Bronte by Lynda
Dean Koontz by Naida
George Eliot by Chris
Dr. Seuss by Belle
Homer by Rebecca
Markus Zusak and John Green by Suey
Michael Chabon by Florinda
Roald Dahl by Jessica