• Unshelved: Life Sucks Jessica Abel (Author), Gabriel Soria (Author), Warren Pleece (Illustrator)

It’s the tale of life as a vampire. Here is the review from Amazon:

Life sucks for Dave Marshall.

The girl he’s in love with doesn’t know he exists, he hates his job, and ever since his boss turned him into a vampire, he can’t go out in daylight without starting to charbroil.

Undead life in its uncoolest incarnation yet is on display in this cinematic, supernatural drama told with gallons of humor and hemoglobin. In striking, colorful, B-movie style artwork and light-hearted, intelligent writing by Jessica Abel, Gabe Soria, and Warren Pleece, Dave Marshall’s story comes alive – in a vampiric kind of way.

If it has been a while since you enjoyed a good vampire novel, then Life Sucks might be perfect for you. Here are some other vampire novels you might like:

• Quotations Weblog » Archive » Unshelved Week: 13 Bullets

• Quotations Weblog » Archive » Twilight by Stephenie Meyer

• Quotations Weblog » Archive » Peeps by Scott Westerfeld

• Quotations Weblog » Archive » The Last Days by Scott Westerfeld

• Sheldon: May 02, 2008

• Sheldon: May 03, 2008

• Sheldon: May 04, 2008 How to Read Moby Dick

In case you didn’t get all the knee-slapping jokes, Herman Melville was the author of Moby Dick. It’s the famous story of Ahab, the obsessed whaler, who chases after Moby Dick, an elusive whale and ends up sacrificing all in the quest.

I’ve never read it.

I don’t know what’s stopping me. I could read the book for free here:

• Moby Dick by Herman Melville - Read Online - The Literature Page

When I started writing this entry, I thought the most famous quote from Moby Dick was this one:

I quickly found out that I was wrong and poor Samuel Taylor Coleridge didn’t get enough attention from my public school education. Instead, I found that the most recognizable quote (at least for me) is this one:

Of course, I thought Khan said it to Captain Kirk in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Little did I know that Star Trek II was really a re-imagination of Moby Dick. Here is a good summation of Moby-Dick references in Star Trek and other sci-fi:

• Moby Dick - Memory Alpha, the Star Trek Wiki

Sheldon had a well-read laugh at Herman Melville, but the truth of the matter is, despite all the references to the book in our society, I suspect that few of us have read it. I, for one, am putting it on my list and will start it as soon as I’m finished with my current book.

It’s rare when I get a quote from a movie, but yesterday while watching Ghost Rider, I wrote down this quote:

You would think that with such a great quote that the movie would be about making good choices in your life, but it seemed to be more about getting a second chance at life.

Here is a preview of the movie:

My favorite bit of inside joke from the movie is the fact that Peter Fonda plays the devil in this movie. Peter Fonda is known for his role in Easy Rider, which is a very different motorcycle movie. You can see the opening credits here:

The complete circle of Peter Fonda as a sort of anti-hero of the sixties to the devil of the present time is my favorite sort of inside joke. It’s probably no coincidence that Ghost Rider was named with such a similar name to Easy Rider (plus the play on words with the famous phrase “ghost writer”).

Ghost Rider was based on the comic book series by the same name. You can purchase the complete comic book collection on DVD-ROM here:

• Ghost Rider the Complete Comic Collection Windows/Mac from Amazon.com

I have never been able to enjoy magazines on a computer; my Mad Magazine collection is sitting in the basement relatively untouched. I prefer REAL books, so here are the trade paperbacks for Ghost Rider.

• Ghost Rider Volume 1: Vicious Cycle by Daniel Way (Author), Mark Texeira (Author), Javier Saltares (Author)

• Ghost Rider Volume 2: The Life & Death Of Johnny Blaze by Daniel Way (Author), Jose Villarrubia (Colorist), Richard Corben (Illustrator), Javier Saltares (Illustrator), Mark Texeira (Illustrator)

• Ghost Rider Volume 3: Apocalypse Soonby Daniel Way (Author), Javier Saltares (Author), Mark Texeira (Author)

• Ghost Rider Volume 4: Revelations by Daniel Way (Author), Javier Saltares (Author), Mark Texeira (Author)

I love comic books and their movies because they deal with the simple story of evil vs. good. Sure, a lot of them try to blur those lines a little, but in the end, I love to have a good guy to root for.

This book is most famous for being mentioned in Jane Austen’s book, Northanger Abbey. Austen’s heroine, Catherine Morland, reads The Mysteries of Udolpho and is so affected by it that she continually faints and sees conspiracies all around her. When I originally read Northanger Abbey, I had no idea that The Mysteries of Udolpho was a REAL book. I thought it was some Gothic horror created from the mind of Austen. When I found out it was a book by a very real author, I immediately made a trip to the bookstore for my own copy.

Amazon’s plot synopsis leaves much to be desired:

A best-seller in its day and a potent influence on Sade, Poe, and other purveyors of eighteenth and nineteenth-century Gothic horror, The Mysteries of Udolpho remains one of the most important works in the history of European fiction. After Emily St. Aubert is imprisoned by her evil guardian, Count Montoni, in his gloomy medieval fortress in the Appenines, terror becomes the order of the day. With its dream-like plot and hallucinatory rendering of its characters’ psychological states, The Mysteries of Udolpho is a fascinating challenge to contemporary readers.

Emily DID spend a lot of time as the prisoner of Count Montoni, but that part of the story lasts less than half of the book. Because of the name of the book, I kept expecting more of the evil Montoni and a horrid return to Udolpho, but I came to the end of the book and the estate was dispatched with a sentence to a character that we never meet.

More importantly, are the themes of integrity that are scattered throughout the book. Emily is the perfect heroine. She is never tempted to vice, even when it may be her only escape from a worse vice, and she is repaid handsomely for it.

Here are my favorite quotes:

And my personal favorite:

Despite Emily’s constant fainting (an average of once a chapter), she is the kind of heroine that governs herself and her passions with conviction. She is completely without ridicule and it was a joy following her on her adventures.

About halfway through the book, I worried that all the loose ends would never be tied up to my satisfaction. I have been betrayed by so many books in the past, that I didn’t believe that Ann Radcliffe could possibly solve all the mysteries that she had lain before me. I shouldn’t have worried. She did an excellent job of writing a complete book with no plot holes. Ann Radcliffe’s final words of the book are:

Sometimes I wish I could invent a time machine just to thank dead authors.

For ALL the quotes from The Mysteries of Udolpho:

• The Quotations Page - The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Radcliffe

• Unshelved - Little Brother by Cory Doctorow

The book will be available tomorrow, but you can download an excerpted reading from Chapter 12 here:

• Cory Doctorow’s craphound.com >> Blog Archive » Reading from Little Brother, my May, 2008 young adult novel

With good reviews from Neil Gaiman, Brian K. Vaughan and Scott Westerfeld, Cory must have done something right.

Here is the plot of the story, courtesy of Amazon:

Marcus, a.k.a “w1n5t0n,” is only seventeen years old, but he figures he already knows how the system works–and how to work the system. Smart, fast, and wise to the ways of the networked world, he has no trouble outwitting his high school’s intrusive but clumsy surveillance systems.

But his whole world changes when he and his friends find themselves caught in the aftermath of a major terrorist attack on San Francisco. In the wrong place at the wrong time, Marcus and his crew are apprehended by the Department of Homeland Security and whisked away to a secret prison where they’re mercilessly interrogated for days.

When the DHS finally releases them, Marcus discovers that his city has become a police state where every citizen is treated like a potential terrorist. He knows that no one will believe his story, which leaves him only one option: to take down the DHS himself.

Cory usually posts his book online for download, but it looks like he’s not doing that for this one. You’ll have to go to the library this time.

Update 04-28-08 8:35am: I just received this email from Cory Doctorow:

Hey, Laura! There’s assuredly be a free CC release of Little Brother — it’ll be online sometime next week, when I get back from visiting family in Toronto.

• Unshelved - Tomorrow #1: When The War Began

Here is a review of the book from Amazon.com:

When Ellie and her friends go camping, they have no idea they’re leaving their old lives behind forever. Despite a less-than-tragic food shortage and a secret crush or two, everything goes as planned. But a week later, they return home to find their houses empty and their pets starving. Something has gone wrong–horribly wrong. Before long, they realize the country has been invaded, and the entire town has been captured–including their families and all their friends. Ellie and the other survivors face an impossible decision: They can flee for the mountains or surrender. Or they can fight.

This is the first book of a series, so if you enjoy it, there are several others to keep you entertained.

• Unshelved - Magic Pickle and the Planet of the Grapes by Scott Morse

The Magic Pickle secretly fights crime from his HQ under Jo Jo’s bed (her house is built on top of the lab that created him). He uses his crime computer and super powers to fight the wicked fruits and veggies of The Brotherhood of Evil Produce. He’s detected some sinister citrus at the Farmer’s Market. One of Jo Jo’s classmates, has brought a strange machine to school, along with a wagonload of fruit (she was soured by the free lemonade). It’s the start of The Raizin’s plan to create a planet of grapes!

Here is Amazon’s review of the book:

Scott Morse introduces one of the most hilarious superheroes ever: a flying, green Magic Pickle!

Magic Pickle is a secret weapon developed in a secret military lab—under little JoJo Wigwam’s bedroom floor. The fearless dill superhero meets his match in this feisty eight-year-old. Together they go after Ray Sin, a renegade raisin from the Brotherhood of Evil Produce. Ray Sin has a dastardly plan: to turn every human being on the planet into big, juicy, mindless grapes, so he can rule the world!

Ray Sin has tricked the new kid in town into becoming his hapless helper and is using the class science fair as his cover. He’s got everybody in the school—kids, the principal, even the janitor—eating big gobs of grapes . . . and turning into roly-poly purple fruits!

Magic Pickle and JoJo act fast: with the skillful use of a juicemaker, they save the day and capture Ray Sin, whose criminal career is now all dried up.

I have to admit that the idea of sentient fruits and vegetables is hard for me to swallow. I can believe in self-aware PLANTS, mind you, but fruits and vegetables have been removed from the plant (or fallen off if left alone), so they seem like amputated limbs more than characters on their own.

The California Raisins, however, they were TOTALLY believable.

Diane mentioned that Rosie O’Donnell had been in the business for thirty years now and she wanted to know what Rosie would say to that girl from thirty years ago. She said:

I’m always so grateful when stars are willing to be honest about their experiences with fame. Thanks, Rosie!

Via: Diane Sawyer’s Interview with Rosie O’Donnell on Good Morning America, April 8 (Video) | TV Crunch

I’ve also seen it attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson, but I cannot find the quote in Bartletts or any other of my quotation books under either name. It was discussed on WikiAnswers here:

• WikiAnswers - Who is frank outlaw

This quote is widely attributed to “Frank Outlaw” on the Web, but no actual other corroborating confirmation actually confirms that this is the correct source.

Popular quotation books - including Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations (17th ed., 2002), Roget’s International Thesaurus of Quotations (1970) and The Harper Book of Quotations (3rd ed., 1993) - DO NOT include this quote or any reference to Frank Outlaw.

In July 2003, a woman named “Elizabeth C.,” claimed to have written it in 1998 and sending to members of an e-mail group of people living with lupus.

According to legend, her words were: “these few lines have since taken on a life of their own via the Internet. I was honored when someone asked if they could post it on their work bulletin board. From there it ended up as a desktop theme. It has traveled everywhere.”

Matt Mullenweg, of WordPress fame, talked about this quote and one of his readers commented:

• Ralph Waldo Emerson « Matt on Not-WordPress

Dawn // February 1, 2007 at 4:15 am

And yet sadly no one has attributed this to its true origin…

The thought manifests as the word;
The word manifests as the deed;
The deed develops into habit;
And habit hardens into character;
So watch the thought and its ways with care,
And let it spring from love
Born out of concern for all beings…

As the shadow follows the body,
As we think, so we become.

• From the Dhammapada
  Sayings of the Buddha

I have added the Budda quote, but until I’m able to find the other in print somewhere, it will continue to be attributed to Unknown. Who is Frank Outlaw? As far as I can tell, he is an imagined author of a quote that may or may not be his.

Here are a few thoughts to keep your mind about this:

And here is one that really IS from Emerson:

• What if the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. had lived? - CNN.com

Although it’s interesting to think about what our world would be like if Martin Luther King Jr. hadn’t died on that April morning, we are only left with what he said before he died:

More about Martin Luther King Jr.:

• Quotations Weblog » Archive » Quotes of the Week: Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968)

• Quotations Weblog » Archive » Martin Luther King Jr. Day

• Martin Luther King, Jr. - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

• A moment frozen in time: Witnesses recall King’s death - CNN.com