Killer Contract: Blood Bowl - Matt Forbeck & Lads Helloven

Matt Forbeck & Lads Helloven - Killer Contract: Blood Bowl (2009)
Comic Book – 130 pages – my copy read whilst staying at the Channon residence, October 2011
- 2 nods out of 5 -



For those readers who have been with the Worm since Day One (now, now; don’t be shy – raise a glass to many a pompous book review over the past two years), then you may have read the review on the novel based on Blood Bowl in 2009. And just what is Blood Bowl? A quick recap for other readers of this blog in recent months: Blood Bowl is a dice-game produced by the Games Workshop, in which the player is a coach of a football team with the aim of scoring touch-downs, and perhaps more importantly: killing the entire opposition. Sound like your cup of tea? Well, read on…

Matt Forbeck was hounded in the previous review of his debut novel (simply titled Blood Bowl). The Worm gave the book a meagre 1 nod out of 5, thus entering the sin-bin of reading and winning that book-reading season’s Shredder Award for Crime’s Against Literature. Poor Mr Forbeck, the Worm hears you muttering. But his latest dabbling in a graphical representation of the unique fictional universe strikes an immediate nod with the reader. Blood, guts, grass and grime: all of these things are brought to life on the page by the efforts of the artist, the wonderfully named: Lads Helloven. The reader is able to feel involved in the progress of the Bad Bay Hackers team as they set off to win the Blood Bowl Championship.

But the spanner in the works? (For there is always a spanner in the works, dear reader): Matt Forbeck himself. The plot is tired and predictable, the dialogue is terrible and clichéd. This is the fifth or sixth story containing the Hackers, and this team always seems to win, becoming the James Bond of fantasy football teams. Each turn of the page brings the inevitable result; with the reader turning ever closer to a sadist in wishing the demise of the book’s “hero”, Dunk Hoffnung.

The formula has gone wrong somewhere. Here we have an interesting idea about psychotic sporting players who chainsaw one another to death, and yet the writer appears settled to make the reader pay for this interest in terms of a stale plot and pointless padding. What if we were to see a different team, away from Mr Hoffnung and the fortunate Bad Bay Hackers: of the Orcs, of the Dwarves, of Elves, of Vampires, and, well, the reader gets the point. A different side to shake up the action.

As the Worm expressed in the earlier review on Forbeck’s novel, he will return for more. A glutton for punishment: oh no! But rather a dedicated fan of the game of Blood Bowl. Yes, he will be back – hoping Mr Forbeck has got his act together in order to produce a real work of interest.


Read my review of Matt Forbeck’s initial novel right here:
http://4eyedbookworm.blogspot.com/2009/07/blood-guts-blood-bowl-by-matt-forbeck.html

Buy Killer Contract here:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Killer-Contract-Blood-Matt-Forbeck/dp/1934506346

British History to the Protectorate - New Joy of Knowledge Encyclopaedia

New Joy of Knowledge Encyclopaedia – British History to the Protectorate (1990)
History – 70 pages – my copy (hardback; 1990) read during September 2011
- 2 nods out of 5 -

Many years ago, gentle folk would seek out on their pursuit of knowledge by ordering large volumes of books – let us call them encyclopaedias – which in many cases were delivered direct to the front door. They promised new windows into the worlds of art, of history, of science, of geography, of all that humankind had to offer. One encyclopaedia a month, at ten pounds a turn, for fifty to one hundred months; bit by bit the collection and, not forgetting, the knowledge of the owner would grow…until one day (normally when the cash balance was significantly lowered) the owner would compete with Einstein-like intelligence.

Fast forward to the twenty-first century. Now all of this knowledge – art, history, science, geography – is condensed on one tiny website: Wikipedia. And what’s more, it is regularly updated. And what’s more and more: its articles range way beyond anything the previous encyclopaedias could ever dare dream about. And what’s more and more and more: this information is free. O, how strange the times are a-changing.

This book on British History to the Protectorate – from The New Joy of Knowledge Encyclopaedia – takes the reader on a journey from ‘Bronze and Iron Age Britain’ right through the chopping off of the head of Charles I in the 1600s. In-between are over twenty chapters on periods and events such as ‘Norman and Angevin England’, ‘The origins of Parliament’ and ‘Elizabeth and the Armada’. As expected with any history claiming to be “British”, the rest of the Isles are given scant coverage, with a couple of their own chapters thrown in for good measure (‘Wales to the Act of Union’, anyone?).

The text is succinct and to the point, covering the major topics and debate. The real surprising feature of this book is its great use of illustration: every chapter has portraits, diagrams, and maps set out in a wonderful and accessible style. Furthermore, the chapters are interspersed with ‘Panorama’ pages detailing the likes of the Bayeux tapestry and a painting on Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales; with the larger A3 paper adding to the allure and detail.

But let us not get too carried away, dear reader. Despite its advantages this book cannot escape what it intrinsically is: an encyclopaedia. As such, it remains stunted in its form and time period; its future looks grim, but when placed alongside its fellow encyclopaedia siblings, the overall picture can be impressive. Wikipedia has expansiveness and elasticity; but even in this digital age nothing beats a colourful and triumphant book shelf.

Richard III: King of England - James Gairdner

James Gairdner – Richard III: King of England
Biography – read on the Kindle for free during September 2011
- 1 nod out of 5 -

We all love a villain in history. Check out the shelves of a nearby bookshop and what we’ll find are books on the likes of Hitler and Stalin. Closer to home, in British history, we place a great emphasis on the failures of our own monarchy: of the losses of Bad King John, on the madness of King George III, and on the monstrous myth that is Richard III.

The worm uses the word ‘myth’, as much of what is commonly known about Richard was the invention of good old Bill Shakespeare. James Gairdner – one of the eminent voices on Tudor history in the Victorian age – conforms to this stereotype in this short biography of the hunchbacked villain who sought power at all costs. True to Shakespeare’s portrayal, Richard is seen butchering all who stand in his way, friend or foe.

Such is the venting of the spleen, Gairdner has been labelled “the Victorian Anti-Richard” for such severe views. Later revisionist works have rebuffed such ideas, with more expressive and expansive conclusions now being deduced about Richard’s reign. Was he the murderer of the princes in the tower, out to grab all the power he could muster; or was he trying to steer England away from ruin? Such questions have no home in Gairdner’s prose, and it is all the poorer without them.

Gairdner wrote a whole stack of biographies on some of the key figures of the Tudor age: Henry VIII, Edward IV, Anne Boleyn, Catherine of Aragon, Edward V, and more and more and more. Some of his works maintained a strong currency until the middle of the twentieth century; but his short biographies – of which this read is one – contain none of the debate and analysis that his longer books became known for.

Richard III will continue to attract critics and supporters; he is a monarch best viewed in a different format. Gairdner’s short rendition of his life is a blunt and tired one best reserved for Victorian historian enthusiasts (wherever they might live!). It might have sufficed in the Victorian age, but unfortunately for the author’s legacy, it simply doesn’t suffice today.

Interzone - William S Burroughs

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

The Basement - Stephen Leather

Stephen Leather - The Basement (2010)
Novella – read on the Kindle during September 2011
- 2 nods out of 5 -

Stephen Leather is one smart cookie. That might not be the technical term, but that statement is a good assessment of his business know-how. His publishers refused to print a few shorter novels that didn’t fit in with his own back catalogue, so rather than hide the manuscripts away in a drawer to gather dust they found a home electronically. Released on the Kindle they sold like a hot cakes; and, it would seem, Mr Leather has been laughing himself silly ever since.

The Worm stumbled across Leather’s success story in a writing magazine feature, and feeling ready to purchase a few texts to christen a new Kindle, The Basement was bought for the small sum of less than one pound.

So, we know the price; we know the back story: but what about the book, the Worm hears you asking! The Basement is a short novel comprised of two concurrent running stories. The first follows a wannabe screenwriter who is targeted as a murder suspect by two police officers; while the second – and more sinister of the two – follows the perspective of an unnamed person who has a woman tied up in the titular basement, used as a sex slave during the novella.

Of course, the suspense – of which Leather excels – leads us, the reader, to believe the two story lines are entwined. And indeed, they are; but with the suspected storyline twist not failing to serve its purpose and stun. The central (first) narrator is genuinely interesting: never bothered by the police officers knocking at his door, his energy is spent on dreaming up new movie ideas, with each of them equally as uninspiring as the last. His life perspective is egotistically centred, as shown nowhere more clearly than in the ransacking of his opponent’s apartment:

‘...in big capital letters I write ‘HOW DO YOU LIKE IT, NIGGER?’ across the mirrored closet. It’s a nice touch, the Nigger bit. Just in case he thinks it might be a couple of homeboys out to feed their habit. That and the fact that nothing as been stolen should point in my direction. I mean, he is a detective and all. I actually feel guilty as I stand and look at the word nigger written in red. It’s not that I’m a racist, I pretty much treat everyone as inferior, but I’ll make Turner mad. Real mad, which is the way I want him.’

However, the limited space of this novella means the plot descends into a simple routine, switching from the action in the basement to that of the screenwriter, from screenwriter back to the basement, and well, you get the drift. A tad monotonous, to say the least. And while Leather may keep the kettle pot of suspense boiling to the brim (along with truly sinister descriptions from the basement), the dialogue is close to shambolic. With such things considered, The Basement never threatens to leave the realms of ‘Quick Read’ to become a ‘Recommend to a Friend’.


Read more about the author here:
http://stephenleather.blogspot.com/2010/10/basement-on-kindle.html

Notes From Underground - Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Fyodor Dostoyevsky – Notes From Underground (1864)
Novel – read on Kindle during August 2011, a free download
- 5 nods out of 5 -

‘Gentlemen, you must excuse me for being over-philosophical; it’s the result of forty years underground!’

Here are the words of the man from underground, the narrator in Dostoyevsky’s revered and renowned short novel from 1864. In the English language it is popularly referred to as Notes from THE Underground; but the Worm feels its more literal translation from Russian befits the writer and the mood much more. After all, just where is THE underground? A place, or perhaps better yet, a mood within us.

Existentialists in coffee shops have spilt much breath upon the merits of this novel. Narrated by an unnamed man, the first part of the story is a collection of rants and rambling observations. Topics are covered, ranging from suffering to theories of reason and logic. While the second part (Apropos of the Wet Snow) follows more of a traditional story pattern, as the narrator seeks off to prove a point to a circle of acquaintances, before making contact with a prostitute, who like himself, is in search of approval (and, perhaps, love). Much is attacked throughout the book: aspirations of love, western philosophy, the bureaucracy of work, manners, social norms, and on and on. Whilst riddles abound on every page.

The novel’s chief selling point is the unnamed narrator himself. Pathetic but scathing, pitiful yet insightful; he is not a man to be trusted. The use of the ‘unreliable narrator’ has come in and out of fashion with every generation, but very rarely is it accomplished to such an art. The reader must question at every turn just what is being said, the subtext, the hidden meaning. Dostoyevsky doesn’t make it easy for us:

‘I believe I made a mistake in beginning to write them, anyway I have felt ashamed all the time I’ve been writing this story; so it’s hardly literature so much as a corrective punishment.’

With the vast amount of thought within these pages, it is easy to assume a vision of Dostoyevsky smugly gazing down upon the reader. But despite the somewhat heavy discussion of free will and of the modern world, there is also a great deal of emotion to sway us. The narrator’s two scenes with the prostitute are intriguing and, aside from philosophical discussion, the strongest in the novel: here we get to see the chief character in action amongst others. After at first berating the prostitute, he tries making amends by giving his address; only to regret this when she threatens to call days later.

Make what you will of the narrator: to trust or not to trust. But the art of Dostoyevsky’s writing cannot be in doubt. Pick up a copy, grab a cup of coffee, fling on a beret, and let your heart sing about existentialist ideas! Notes from Underground is a classic to be enjoyed.