You, too, can be a chick magnet.

First there was the hipster.

Now there’s the hipster-shuffle.

More on book reviews.

Jan posted in comments, so I followed the link to one of her reviews.

The Birthday Party: A Memoir of Survival. By Stanley N. Alpert. Putnam’s, 306 pp., $24.95.

By Janice Harayda

January used to be the low season in publishing, a time when firms released titles that weren’t sexy enough to compete with gift or beach books. No more, and anybody who wants proof needs only to pick up The Birthday Party. To say that this terrific book tells the true story of a New York stick-up gone haywire is like saying that Psycho is about a motel with an eccentric owner.

Now THIS is a review. Why? Because there’s enough in the first paragraph to tell me whether I want to read this book or not, without revealing anything spoilery about the book. I didn’t read farther. I know this is a book that will go on my list. (For a writer, it’s probably horrifying to think, “She read one paragraph and no more?” But that’s the way I read reviews, anyway, unless I truly have no plans to see the movie/tv show or read the book.)

The title of the review is funny and makes me want to read more, and she presents the subject matter of the novel (and her positive impression of it) in a way that let’s me know immediately, this is probably my kind of book.

Oh, and of course, if you want to read the rest of her review, follow the link above!

So. What do YOU look for in book reviews?

And thanks, Jan, for stopping by!

What I didn’t know about book reviews.

I’m …. okay, a lot of different words are clamoring for top billing here. But I’m just going to use the word, perplexed.

Since I’m listening to an audiobook that is diverting and long (two things I appreciate in audiobooks) I thought I’d look up a couple of reviews. Why? I have no idea. Because I certainly got more than I bargained for.

I assumed book reviewers reviewed books without revealing the key plot points that would spoil the book for you.

Guess not. Because the reviewer, Regina Marler, seems to be imminently qualified and is a regular contributor to various national publications. What can I say? I was naive.

So, in future, I believe I’ll be avoiding book reviews the way I avoid movie trailers. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a movie trailer that revealed quite this much.

Just in case there’s anybody reading who might want to read Special Topics in Calamity Physics I’m going to judiciously edit (censor?) the first two sentences of her review:

In her senior year at St. Gallway High School, Blue van Meer fulfills the dreams of all bookish, lonely girls: to get in with the in-crowd, score a (deleted, though perhaps kind of predictable event), land an acceptance from (also deleted though perhaps predictable event), wind up as (okay, okay, this is deleted despite being predictable, too) and solve the death by hanging of a beloved teacher. Oh, yes–she also uncovers her father’s (major-spoiler-deleted-here).

If I’m not mistaken, we have the entire plot in a nutshell in the first two sentences of the review.

This reminds me of–don’t read the rest of this paragraph unless you want Gone With the Wind spoiled!–when a guy at my church asked where I was in the book and when I said, “The women are sewing and they’re all mad at Scarlett and I don’t know why,” he replied, “Oh, Frank gets killed, she marries Rhett and Rhett leaves her.” Well, yes, you could make a good case for the fact that there’s a LOT that happens that he didn’t tell me, a LOT of surprises and twists and turns left in the book. So yes, you could also make a case that much if not most of what makes SPECIAL TOPICS special isn’t evident in those sentences.

But it still spoils the PLOT.

I’m in the middle of the book and half of those events haven’t happened yet. As for the the discovery of her father, well, he’s obviously odd and I’ve wondered about him but I hadn’t thought of him actually having a (deleted), so that is a major spoiler for me.

You notice I left what might seem another major spoiler — the solving of the hanging of a beloved teacher.

Well, that’s a bit problematical. You see, on the first page you know this character was found hanging, dead. Since I’m listening and not reading, I can’t go back and look to see, but I believe it’s Blue who finds the body. And I don’t think the character was identified as a teacher, just as a name. And while I wasn’t told that Blue solves it, that is not a spoiler, I don’t think. Because having the discovery of a dead body followed by the character figuring out the how and why is not spoiler material — I don’t think. Check back with me after I finish the book.

One of the first things I was ever told about plotting was, “You can tell the reader anything on page one and be assured they will forget it.”

In this case, I admit that by the time we actually got around to meeting this character, it had slipped my mind that she was the one referenced on page one. I eventually realized it, and even w/o being able to flip back and look I knew that was where the story was headed.

By the way, if you’re wondering — that’s really a pretty decent rule. I recall a movie where in the opening scene a paranoid character is talking to a shrink and saying, “A woman in my office is trying to kill me, and I think it’s this woman who…yadda” Well, the character IS murdered, but by a different woman in his office. (Or in his life. I forget.) And it’s not until the end of the movie that you find out — he was RIGHT. The real murderer WAS the woman in his office who….yadda. And the writer told you that at the very beginning, in the very first sentence, but then set up the plot so that you didn’t remember it — or if you did, you thought it was just part of the dead person’s paranoia or ignorance that they suspected the “wrong” person.

But I digress.

The issue is this. I don’t read movie reviews, television reviews or book reviews to find out the major plot points in advance. I have learned which local tv reviewer to avoid, and have learned to avoid reading beyond the first sentence or two of a movie or book review.

I don’t recall ever having a book or movie spoiled for me in the first sentence until now.

I think I’ll avoid all reviews.

It seems less risky.

Soundtracks

This morning I was listening to NPR’s Morning Edition and mulling over the soul-wrenching, adrenaline-punching power of music.

Classical music, in particular.

Don’t believe me?

Well, in honor of the Bowl-which-cannot-be-considered-Super without the Cowboys in it –

Listen to this fun report on the composers who write the music for NFL Films.

And we’re not just talking variations on “Drunken Sailor.”

Sidebar: Did you know that the Dallas Cowboys didn’t christen themselves “America’s Team?” It was NFL Films that did.

But, back to the subject at hand –

Soundtracks. Soundtracks exist for only one purpose — to enhance the emotion of a scene. Whether you go back to the silent films and a piano building to a crescendo as the hero rescues the heroine from the railroad tracks –

Or the bum-bum-bum-bum of Jaws.

Which brings me to the other report this morning that dealt with music.

Take a deep breath, sit back and listen to an act of passion, of love, of pain, of honor.

It’s a compelling event and a moving program, this story about a Requiem that was the result of musicians coming together in a volunteer effort to raise money and awareness for Darfur.

But when you hear it — you realize this isn’t just about money. It’s everything a requiem is meant to be, instruments and voices soaring in pain, in fear, in triumph, in prayer — for the souls of the dead.

Don’t skip it because it sounds like a downer. It’s anything but. Verdi’s the same guy who wrote the fabulous Carmen (soundtrack to the original Bad News Bears.)

And come back and tell me what you think.

Music. Emotion. That’s what it’s about. Now and always.

Listen.

Feel.

A Writing Competition

If you’re a writer and want to enter a contest, check out this one.

I heard about in class the other night. People post the first chapters of their novels and other people critique and rate them.

Have fun!