Smokin' Aces

Smokin' Aces stars Ben Affleck, Ray Liotta, Ryan Reynolds, and Jeremy Piven among others. It's an ensemble piece that tells the story of Buddy Israel, a Las Vegas magician mixed up with the mob. The mob wants him dead, and Israel wants a deal with the FBI for protective custody in exchange for information on the mob operations in Vegas. Meanwhile, news of the $1 million dollar price on Israel's head spreads like wildfire, and more hitmen, bounty hunters, and bail enforcement agents are all on Israel's trail in addition to the two FBI agents tasked with taking him into custody the minute the deal goes through. Everything starts to spiral out of control as these various eccentric and dangerous personalities all converge on a Nevada hotel gunning for Israel. Some want him dead; others want him alive.

This movie is fast paced and has quite a few colorful characters; with its ensemble and myriad twists, it reminds me of the Ocean's Eleven movies. There are many different threads as the narrative bounces between characters before they all connect for an explosive and violent showdown at one unfortunate hotel.

I recommend you check out this movie, especially if you enjoyed Ocean's Eleven and its sequels. It may not be quite as smart, but it is definitely in the same vein as that film.

--Reviewed by Ms. Angie

The Girl Who Stopped Swimming by Joshilyn Jackson

Until the drowned girl came to Laurel's bedroom, ghosts had never walked in Victorianna. The houses were only twenty years old, with no accumulated history to put creaks in the hardwood floors or rattle at the pipes.

from page 1, The Girl Who Stopped Swimming

I had previously read the first 30 pages of Jackson's Between, Georgia before recommending the library buy her new novel, The Girl Who Stopped Swimming. So even before I picked this book up, I knew I was in for some uniquely drawn characters. Lately it seems this is just the lastest in a string of books that I've been reading that happen to be populated by eccentric characters. Why I haven't gotten past the first 30 pages of Between, Georgia is a long story that has to do with my book reading habits/rituals, and it is a little ... I'm not sure if obsessive or neurotic are the right words for it, but someday, I will get that one read as well.

The Girl Who Stopped Swimming is the story of two sisters, Laurel and Thalia. Thalia is a trip and a half and can be at times excruciatingly infuriating on one page and then redeem herself in the next page by confessing her willingness to "burn down Paris" if that's what it takes to protect her niece. Late one night Laurel finds her daughter's best friend drowned in the family pool in the backyard. The mystery of what exactly transpired that night proves the catalyst that leads to an airing of the family's dirty laundry after which no one's life will be quite the same. In the end the book takes a bit of a disturbing twist when it comes to the resolution of the mystery of the death of the girl who stopped swimming.

Jackson's characters are unique, eccentric and richly drawn. After the arrival of Thalia in quiet, little Victorianna, the story quickly careens off on a wild ride while the reader hangs on until its dramatic ending. Ultimately, it becomes a story of what one is willing to do to protect those one loves.

I highly recommend you pick up this book. It is available from Matthews Public Library.

--Reviewed by Ms. Angie

Response To Living Legends: Question to the Community Vlog

Greetings, dear blog readers! The library has recently posted a new video to our YouTube channel. This video was posted in response to another video from Keith Richards, a member of the Rolling Stones. In order to fully appreciate our video, you should first view the Richards video. To do so, please click on this link to our video; right below our video is a yellow box that says "This is a video response to Living Legends-Rolling Stones: Question to the Community." Click on this direct link to the Richards video. After you have viewed the video, you can then click the "back" button in your internet browser to return to our video response to view it. We hope you enjoy both videos. We know we did!

Watchmen by Alan Moore

The graphic novel, Watchmen, by Alan Moore is currently being adapted into a big screen version in Hollywood. If you're a big comic book movie fan, you might want to read or re-read the graphic novel before the movie version comes out.

Watchmen takes place in 1985 in an alternate universe where "masked adventurers" a.k.a. superheroes once roamed the streets fighting crime. Then a 1977 federal law banned masked adventurers, and they disappeared from the streets. Most adventureres hung up their masks and assumed normal lives. Now people who used to wear the mask to fight crime are being mysteriously targeted for elimination. The central mystery concerns the person who is eliminating these former masked adventurers and the motive behind their elimination.

I don't normally read graphic novels or comic books though I have read about a handful, such as V for Vendetta (saw the movie too) and Maus I & II by Art Spiegelman. One of the complaints that I usually have when I read a comic book is the unnaturalness of some of the dialogue. I had the same issue with some of the character dialogue in Watchmen. The artwork is colorful and in many ways this is an unusual graphic novel in that the chapters alternate between comic panels and prose. The prose is often relevant to backstory of the events and characters in the comic panels and range from excerpts of one character's memoir to another character's nature journal article. However, I often found these prose sections long, boring and tedious and looked forward to returning to the comic panels.

Any comic book fan or graphic novel fan will love this one. And if you're interested in branching out in your reading genres, you might try this graphic novel or any of the others mentioned in this post. This title is available upon request from Lebanon Community Library.

--reviewed by Ms. Angie

The Monsters of Templeton by Lauren Groff

The day I returned to Templeton steeped in disgrace, the fifty-foot corpse of a monster surfaced in Lake Glimmerglass. It was one of those strange purple dawns that color July there, when the bowl made by the hills fills with a thick fog and even the songbirds sing timorously, unsure of day or night.

from page 1, The Monsters of Templeton

The Monsters of Templeton by Lauren Groff tells the story of Willie Upton and her search for her father. Willie is a descendant of Marmaduke Temple, the founding father of Templeton, the sleepy little town where she grew up. Both of her mother's parents were descendants of Temple--one through his marriage and the other through his dalliance with the family's slave. For years Willie's mother, Vi, regaled her daughter with the story of her conception: how Vi left home as a teenager for a hippie commune in San Francisco where pot and free love were the norm; how Vi could never be sure of Willie's father because she was with a different man at the commune nearly every night. When Willie comes home to nurse a broken heart and ponder her future, Vi drops a bombshell: Willie's father is actually a man in town who also claimed to be a descendant of Marmaduke Temple through some ancestor's extramarrital affair. This is a genealogical mystery as Willie trolls her family tree looking for the branch that spawned her father. Nearly equal time is give to the many, brightly colorful, vividly drawn characters that populate Willie's family tree. The narrator shifts from Willie to other ancestors as she searches for the one from whom her father is descended.

You will enjoy this book as much for the mystery of Willie's paternity and the nature of the monster that is found in the lake as you will for the humorous, eccentric characters that populate the novel. I highly recommend you try out this book. It is available upon request from Lebanon Community Library and Myerstown Community Library.

--Reviewed by Ms. Angie