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Month: January 2015

On Marshawn Lynch, and Why it’s Okay to be Antisocial (or even a jerk)

Published by Johnny Compton on January 27, 2015

Marshawn-Lynch-Media-Day-Super-BowlMarshawn Lynch showed up at Super Bowl Media Day today solely to avoid a $500,000 fine and, predictably, said a whole lot of nothing. Not literally, although now that I’ve thought of it, I really wish his actual, repeated quote would have been “A whole lot of nothing.” That would be hilarious. As the title of this post likely gives away, I’m kind of on Lynch’s side on this. I say kind of because I don’t feel that this is anything worth choosing a side over. But what the hell, I’m a guy with an opinion and a website and a novel I should be working on, so why not waste some time chiming in on this. READ MORE

Confessions of a Fearphile: ‘Shudders’

Confessions of a Fearphile: ‘Shudders’

Published by Johnny Compton on January 22, 2015

I think I’m still too young to be using phrases like, ‘They don’t make them like they used to.” Given that I don’t have kids of my own and don’t read current horror anthologies that are geared toward kids, I really have no clue if they do or don’t actually make any more anthologies like Shudders (edited by Ross R. Olney). But from what I gather from the people I know who do have kids, I’m guessing that much of what grade-schoolers are given to read these days isn’t half as grim as some of the stuff I picked up from the school library when I was in third grade. READ MORE

Traveler’s Book Review: Nightfall by John Farris

Traveler’s Book Review: Nightfall by John Farris

Published by Johnny Compton on January 19, 2015

Odds are this premise will sound familiar to you.

An enigmatic homicidal psychopath makes a daring, impossible escape from a mental hospital. His sole objective is to hunt down and murder a female family member. Along the way to his goal he murders a number of other people who get in his way and proves to be all but unstoppable, and there are vague allusions to him even being supernatural.

Playing “spot the similarities” between two works of fiction is often a mug’s game; paint the picture broadly enough and any story can be made similar to any other, but the details will usually belie the notion that the stories genuinely mirror one another. Nonetheless, if you’re a horror fan who likes movies as much as literature, then that description in the first paragraph probably brought John Carpenter’s Halloween to mind. It’s also an apt (albeit broad) description of the plot to John Farris’s novel Nightfall. READ MORE

Confessions of a Fearphile: Simon’s Soul by Stanley Shaprio

Published by Johnny Compton on January 19, 2015

Simon's Soul Cover1It took a while for me to realize that the things that scared me most were products of my imagination. That’s not to say I’ve never been scared by a movie or a book, obviously. But much of what’s really stuck with me through the years were products largely or sometimes solely of my mind. I forget exactly how young I was when I started praying for nightmare-free sleep before going to bed, but it should have been apparent to me then. And if not then, it should have been apparent around the time I first became aware of a relatively obscure novel titled Simon’s Soul. READ MORE

Belated respects to Texas movie theater mogul John Santikos

Published by Johnny Compton on January 12, 2015

I actually met John Santikos once. I was much younger and was interviewing for an assistant management position with one of this theaters here in San Antonio, a position for which I was grossly, dramatically underqualified. Needless to say, Mr. Santikos made the sound decision of not hiring me to do something I’d never done before (most of my work experience then was at the ground level of office work), but he did offer me a job as part of the theater staff–taking tickets, conessions, that sort of thing–with the potential to progress. I’m still in my 30’s and that time doesn’t seem like it should feel so far away yet, but it does. Far enough that I can’t imagine what the hell I was thinking in even applying for the job, except that it must have been one of those times in my life where I was between gigs and throwing my résumé at any job in the newspaper that I thought I had a hint of a whisper of a chance at getting. The fact that I somehow ended up being interviewed by the man whose name was the same as theater’s (along with one of his managers) caught me off guard. The fact that he didn’t react as though I was completely wasting his time made quite an impression on me. In fact, he was exceedingly pleasant and patient. READ MORE

First New Books of the New Year

First New Books of the New Year

Published by Johnny Compton on January 11, 2015

Belated Happy New Year’s greetings everyone. I promise to do more than virtually no blogging whatsoever in 2015.

On to the topic of the present post. I had never been to a library sale prior to last week. The good folks in Bandera, Texas–a forty-five minute drive northwest of San Antonio, into and through the Hill Country–were holding such a sale at the County Library. I got there a little later than I’d have liked to, but there was still plenty to choose from, and the picture above is the loot I made off with (thanks to the ladies running the sale who were kind enough to provide the box for my bounty). READ MORE