The Star Online: Lifestyle: Bookshelf
The Star Online: Lifestyle: Bookshelf |
| Posted: 25 Nov 2011 02:21 AM PST Fear Itself #7 (of 7) MARVEL Universe's main event for 2011 ends in a sombre and abrupt fashion. While those familiar with Norse mythology would have known the outcome of the Thor-Serpent encounter, Fear Itself is one of those story arcs that you go in knowing the ending but yet hoping that there will be a twist to it. Ironically, the House of Ideas decides to stick to the original script and presents Thor's end in cataclysmic fashion. Before I jump to the end, a quick recap of this seven-parter sees the mightiest heroes in Midgard (Earth) and Asgard being divided by the emergence of the Serpent on Earth. Released by Sin (the Red Skull's daughter) from its entombment, the Serpent rewards her and six others (Juggernaut, Absorbing Man, Titania, Attuma, Grey Gargoyle and the Hulk) with enchanted hammers – en route to a series of global destructions. Surprisingly, despite the Serpent's Asgard-heritage, Odin wants no part in stopping its onslaught and even goes to the extent of withdrawing all Asgardians (including Thor) from Earth. Subsequently, it was revealed that the Serpent is actually Odin's brother and the true exiled King of Asgard. However, what worried Odin most was the "prophecy" that the Serpent's demise would only come at the expense of Thor's life! Amidst the Asgardian-drama, Earth's Mightiest Heroes are caught in the crossfire and incur substantial collateral damage, particularly the "life" of Bucky Barnes @ Winter Soldier/Captain America 2. Outmatched by the Serpent's posse, Tony Stark succeeds in getting Odin's blessings via a set of Uru weaponry to even the odds. While this merely enables our heroes to save the day, the Thor-Serpent battle is inevitable and ... so is the ending. Having read the epic Walt Simonson inspired Thor-Serpent battle way back in the 1980s (Thor (Vol.1) #380), this modern day version mostly lacks "oomph" in terms of battle choreography. The saving grace comes from Thor's final moments with Odin. I doubt anyone would shed a tear (unless Loki whips up some mischief) as a resurrection is inevitable. After all this script has been done before and there's an Avengers movie looming next summer. Overall, Fear Itself comes to me like a mega-Maximum Carnage event but with a better ending. Fear Itself #7.1 WHAT'S 7.1, you ask? Not a numbering error but rather a "sneaky" way of capitalising on epilogues. Fortunately, this issue sizzles despite going against a fundamental grouse in comics – resurrection! However, what makes the "resurrection" here different is the character, the writer and the timing. Character-wise, Bucky Barnes doesn't deserve to die (yet) again – especially after being resurrected a few years back from a five-decade long slumber. Most importantly, be it as the Winter Soldier or the "new" Captain America, Bucky has offered a new dimension to the concept of Star Spangling adventures. On the writer itself, if anyone should kill Bucky, the honour belongs to Ed Brubaker – the man who resurrected him and elevated his status into a key Marvel character. Hence, (Matt) Fraction does not deserve carte blanche rights to "kill" Bucky. Lastly, the timing of the announcement of the "resurrection" isn't too long. While Steve Rogers may disagree, as evident by his manhandling of Nick Fury for staging Bucky's "death", a four month' wait is within my tolerance zone. This is the issue that deals with Bucky's "death" post-Fear Itself. Obviously, he didn't die and the "excuse" here was that Fury and Black Widow substituted him with a Life Model Decoy (LMD) after his near death encounter with Sin. While I would normally find such reasoning as lame, I must admit that my personal bias towards Bucky makes me a sucker for the good news. Now I hope that Marvel fully justifies this about-turn in the upcoming Winter Soldier regular series. Fear Itself – The Fearless #1 IF the "point 1" issues are your cup of tea, then here are a dozen issues worth of the Fear Itself aftermath that should grant you eternal happiness ... well, for the next three months, at least (each issue ships weekly). Sin shares her protagonist role here with the Valkyrie, as both femme fatale characters embark on a tough challenge to recover all of the mystical artifacts left during the Fear Itself episode. With Cap keeping the weapons on Earth (instead of Asgard), albeit at different secret locations, it takes a few pages for the raiders to pinpoint its location. Here's where I feel that Reed or Franklin Richards could have whipped up a "pocket dimension" to safeguard the weapons better. Expect this treasure hunt storyline to dominate the upcoming issues and I'm rooting for Valkyrie to elevate her role in the Marvel Universe, especially with a Defenders revival in sight. Comics courtesy of Earth 638 (2nd Floor Kelana Mall, Jalan SS6/12, Kelana Jaya, Petaling Jaya, Selangor/ Hotline: 03-7804 8380 /e-mail: earth638@yahoo.com). Full content generated by Get Full RSS. |
| Posted: 25 Nov 2011 01:16 AM PST The Next Always LEFT standing after the war and having passed through the hands of many owners, this inn in a sleepy American town in Maryland is rumoured to be haunted. Then along come the Montgomery brothers, Beckett, Ryder and Owen, and their eccentric mother who decides to refurbish the place. On top of this, Beckett has another personal project to see to: the girl he set his sights on when he was 16 years old, the one he is still determined to make his own. Is That A Fish In Your Ear? – Translation And The Meaning Of Everything PEOPLE speak different languages. Without translation, we would not be able to cope with the diversity of languages in the world today. From foreign films to fairytale books, translation is at the heart of many things we do. How do you translate a joke? What's the difference between a native tongue and a learned one? Can machines ever replace human translators? Will Star Trek's universal translator ever become a reality? This book shows how much we can learn about ourselves and others just by examining how we use translation. Within Chang's Walls WHEN the Japanese captured Singapore in 1942, the European population was rounded up and sent to internment camps where they remained until the end of the war. The Japanese wardens left the running of the camps to the internees and they soon organised themselves into an elaborate and functioning community. The author was among the internees and he kept diaries and records during those trying times. This is the story of his survival and the triumph of the human spirit. Why I Am A Five Percenter THE Five Percenters, a movement that began as a breakaway sect from the Nation of Islam in 1960s Harlem in New York, has been accused of being everything from a street gang to a revolutionary group, even a black parallel to the Hell's Angels. The group has been denounced by white America as racists and by orthodox Islam as heretics for its teachings. The author examines the thought system behind the Five Percent culture and its critique of organised religion. The White People And Other Weird Stories WELSHMAN Arthur Machen is an actor, journalist and devotee of Celtic Christianity who lived in the late 19th and early 20th century. He is known for stories that delve into the supernatural and bizarre. His works have drawn comparisons with that of H.P. Lovecraft and Edgar Allan Poe. This re-issued collection of short stories offers an introduction to his style. Included is a foreword by film director and screenwriter Guillermo del Toro, who himself recently completed a trilogy of horror/sci-fi books. Crossbones IT has been 12 years since Somali-American professor Jeebleh left Mogadishu. Returning to see old friends, he brings with him his son-in-law, Malik, who is a journalist intent on covering the region's ongoing turmoil. Upon arrival, Jeebleh is surprised to find an eerie calm reigning instead of the expected chaos. But the quiet of the city does not last long, and when raiders fall upon the city, it becomes a battle zone. And in the midst of the chaos, Malik's brother is searching for his stepson who is believed to have been recruited for a dangerous task. This book completes Farah's Past Imperfect trilogy. Hidden Treasure SHE was raised in a racially divided community and married young. She sought many different paths to enlightenment but always met with a dead end – until she travelled to India and met her teacher in 1990. Given the name Gangaji on the banks of the river Ganga (her real name is Antoinette Roberson Varner), she immersed herself in her spiritual calling. This is her story and a lesson in seeking the truth and achieving lasting contentment. Full content generated by Get Full RSS. |
| Posted: 25 Nov 2011 12:49 AM PST Presenting one of the best Malaysian short story collections of recent years. Malaysian Tales Retold And Remixed FOLKTALES hold a mirror up to our inner lives and provide us with a shared frame of reference, so it's small wonder that many modern authors (among them Angela Carter in The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories and Adèle Geras who writes the introduction to this book) have been inspired to update these traditional stories. In Malaysian Tales Retold And Remixed, editor Daphne Lee (who writes the weekly Tots To Teens column in Star2 On Sunday) pulls together some of Malaysia's finest fiction writers (as well as Singapore's O Thiam Chin) to share their versions of traditional stories. What results is a collection of very fresh new fiction with its roots in the oral past, but exploring contemporary concerns. The writing is most effective when the writers give their legendary characters a human voice, exploring their motivations and preoccupations. Endless Night by Lee gives a voice to the legendary character Puteri Gunung Ledang and transforms her into a "wholly magical entity" in a piece that is both lyrical and sensual. Preeta Samarasan's retelling of Si Tanggang captures the depth of a mother's heartbreak and makes it entirely plausible that this wronged woman could utter a curse that would turn her own child to stone. Samarasan also transforms the Pulau Langkawi legend of Mahsuri, a woman accused of adultery and summarily executed, into a moving contemporary love story of a young woman much wronged, both by her absentee husband and by her delinquent brother who claims to have killed his sister for the family honour. The writer uses the piece to ask important questions about sexuality in Malaysia – an issue, she says, which is quite inseparable from race and religion. In several other stories in the collection, the female protagonist emerges as stronger and wiser than in the original version and violent confrontation is replaced with wit and diplomacy. This is certainly the case in Karina Bahrin's A Little Warm Death where the legend of Puteri Sa'adong is given a contemporary twist as jet-setting wife Sadie manages to finally persuade her reluctant stay-at-home husband to accompany her on her travels. It is remarkable how well O Thiam Chin's The Last Voyage and Janet Tay's The Gift mirror each other. Each takes a real historical character around whom legends have accrued, largely because we have so few solid facts about them, and then create entirely convincing voices for them. O Thiam Chin shows us Admiral Zheng He reflecting on his great sea voyages and past glories; he shows us too his private pain and longing, as he prepares now to venture into the unknown territory of love. The Gift revisits the story of Hang Li Poh sent from her home in China and delivered "appropriately packaged like a birthday gift fit for a king" to marry Sultan Mansur Shah of Malacca, a sweetener for a trading partnership between the two nations. In both stories there is a revealing of physical mutilations (for Hang Li Po it is her bound feet, for Zheng He the scars of castration), and a hope for acceptance in the face of truth. There is more lighthearted fare in the book. Playwright Ann Lee's Su And Her Natural Love For Swimming brings together an unfulfilled housewife and a rather strange swimming pool attendant who form an unlikely friendship. Amir Muhammad's contribution – written in the form of a proposal to a film studio head for a remake of Raja Bersiang – is a tongue in cheek piece in which Amir draws on his extensive knowledge of the local film industry. As he suggests each change (transposing the story to a private secondary school, tapping into the teenage vampire craze, turning it into a musical) the story becomes increasingly farcical. Another piece that stands out is Rehman Rashid's The Legend Of Din Ketolak which grew out of his research for a series of articles he was commissioned to write on Pulau Pangkor. The voice of the old man comes through most strongly as he tells us about the days when the Malays were giants, three times bigger than they are now, and true heroes. Elsewhere, Zed Adams' rewriting of Batu Belah gives the traditional story an imaginative sci-fi twist; Ho Lee Ling accounts for the strange Singha creature spotted by the Prince of Palembang after which the Lion City got it's name; and Kee Thuan Chye retells the story of Hang Nadim the young man who saves Singapura from the swordfish scourge. It is, as Kee says, "a tale that speaks to us today", with its echoes of the contemporary political scene, and indeed he has used it as the basis for his bitingly satirical play The Swordfish, Then The Concubine. Working with original tales clearly gave the writers a firm framework on which to hang their own ideas. If I might be permitted a slight niggle though, a short synopsis of each original story would have helped readers to appreciate the transformation. (Perhaps this information could have been put on a website?) However, most of the retellings are strong enough to be enjoyed in their own right, and this is without doubt one of the best Malaysian short story collections of recent years. Sharon 'Bibliobibuli' Bakar blogs at thebookaholic.blogspot.com. Full content generated by Get Full RSS. |
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