Month: February 2013

Abandon Hope, Ye Seekers of Customer Service!

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by Jas Faulkner

Here’s the thing about me and customer service:  I know there are wonderful people who work the phones and chat lines.  They manage to make the experience of correcting someone else’s mess up as painless as possible.  Most of the time, I am lucky enough to get one of those hardworking people who are filling a position that is often thankless and hideously underpaid.  I love those people.  In fact, I usually send letters to call centers and compliment people who make it a point to not provide me with fodder for articles like this one.

However, there are times when I get people who have turned contrarian ineptitude into a piece of performance art that would send Diamanda Galas into a corner to weep softly and wave away a fit of the vapors so she could get back to terrifying unsuspecting music lovers.

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The Phantom Lady–Best 100 Mysteries Of All Time

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The Phantom Lady  William Irish (Cornell Woolrich) 1942 IP I know you’re all thinking, ‘oh no, not HIM again!’ but yes, Woolrich again, and again, and again, because he was that good. I was going to write a review of  I Married a Dead Man until i realized I’d written an article about selling it, … Read more

Little Davids Take On Amazon Giant

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So a few independent bookstores decided to sue Amazon and the major publishers who made a devil’s deal to control e-books. From the Huffington Post: “Three independent bookstores are taking Amazon and the so-called Big Six publishers (Random House, Penguin, Hachette, HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster and Macmillan) to court in an attempt to level the … Read more

Robin Hathaway, Lovely Lady, Fine Author Passes Away

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Whenever I hear of another writer passing away, I feel as though the literary world has been diminished just a little bit. Robin Hathaway was not a best selling author, she didn’t set the world on fire with her written thoughts, but she was a lovely lady with a smart detective and was given a … Read more

A Critic’s Lament

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by Jas Faulkner 

grump 1Writers occasionally go through periods when the energy is there, but nothing seems to gel.  An idea may formulate and at first it might seem like a sound investment of creative energy.  Then the harsh reality sets in that the back space key has erased nearly one thousand words in one to three hundred word increments.  No loss there.  It was all so much verbal sludge to be hosed away. Maybe the initial idea was good, but this just isn’t its time.  I know this feeling only too well.  It sums up my week in writing.

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Top 5 Book to Film Adaptations

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a guest post by Sarah Murray It can often be hard to watch a beloved book brought to life on the big screen. The characters never look like you imagined and often large parts of the novel are left out. Sometimes however, you’ll find a rare gem, a movie that’s just as good, if not better, than … Read more