Lower East Side Librarian

Whew! This one went by quickly. Well that's partially because I had to finish it before taking off for the US Social Forum in Detroit. It's a new book, so I couldn't renew it, and it's due before I'll get back. Anyway, it's the continuing saga of Cincinnati witch Rachel Morgan and her partners Jenks, a pixy; and Ivy, a vampire as they fend off coven witches, powerful elves, and greedy fairies trying to fuck with them.

I'll tell you off the bat that if you're looking for another Time Traveler's Wife, this ain't it. I'm not referring to the quality of the writing. You know what, actually I'm mystified by this book. It's the story of two sets of twins, one estranged and one symbiotic; and the residents of the building where three of the four twins lived or live. Pretty much no one in the story is sympathetic, and at least one of them is downright horrible. There's sort of a side story about a guy with debilitating OCD. Because I'm so baffled by a writer I previously so enjoyed, I'm choosing to believe that there are deeper meanings to everything that I'm just not getting. Otherwise, I just didn't care for this book. A fair amount.

An aspiring journalist ca. 1990 attending a high school journalism camp queried the keynote on what to do to become a foreign correspondent. He (I think it was a he) responded, "Learn Russian." So that is what the Tex-Mex teen set out to do, and that's how she ended up in Moscow for about a year. Hers is a coming-of-age political memoir of a lefty journalist trying to sort out Revolution and her own identity. Well, the identity part sort of came last. She had to visit lots of foreign countries before she realized there were some important things she needed to learn about her own culture.

Another zine by Celia that makes you adore zines despite that fact that you are reading and cataloging 50 of them per weekend! Well, maybe that's just me, but I would think that anyone would appreciate la C-Dog's birthday creation regardless of how immersed to the scalp they may or may not be in zines.

I've long wondered what zines' fanzine predecessors looked like. Finally, through the son of a friend of my father, I've managed to see one--or a modern incarnation of one at least. APA-50 was born in 1974 and its membership was originally limited to those born after 1974 and was meant for science fiction fans as a venue for their own contributions to the genre. Per the introduction, each member's contribution is called a zine (or an ish), and all of the contributions compiled is a mailing. The most viable link I found for the APA is appropriately an Angelfire site. I'm not sure how private the contents are since membership is small, and my copy was sent on spec that I might consider joining, so I'll keep my contents somewhat general.