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E.L. Doctorow once said that Edgar Allen Poe was the best bad writer in American history. I would suggest that Journey was the best bad band in rock history. Blessed with a classic rock pairing of a great singer and a great lead guitarist—Steve Perry and Neil Schon, respectively—Journey was a hit-machine all through the…
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Hey, it’s been DAYS since I plugged my book, so obviously it’s time for yet another shameless plug! Just in time for Christmas! Amazon is running a sale on my book, Twice the Trouble. It’s 60% off! In hardcover! It would make a heck of a Christmas gift. I’m just sayin…
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(Author’s Note: this post originally appeared on my old blog, Bakhtin’s Cigarettes.) I don’t want to jinx the man, but the fact that Kirk Douglas still lives is an unmitigated source of joy for me. If you believe, as I do, that movie stars become movie stars because of some internal life-force, whose aura is palpable even…
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Last month, I reran an old post about how much I love the classic sci-fi film Forbidden Planet. Then, just over a week later in a striking and somewhat sad example of synchroncity, the last suriving cast member of that film, Earl Holliman, passed away at the age of 94. Holliman’s brief performance as the…
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The ad starts with a thirty-something blond man standing in the kitchen of what appears to be an expensive, post-modern home, spacious and bright, with some well-manicured trees visible through the bay windows. Dressed in a tasteful-yet-generic linen shirt, the man is vaguely handsome yet nerdy. With his Germanic features, beard, and shoulder-length blond hair,…
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Christmas came early for me this year! Many thanks to Ms. Oline Cogdill and the good folks at the Sun-Sentinel for putting Twice the Trouble on their Best Mystery Fiction Books of 2024 list! I am very honored.
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One of the coolest classes I took at U.F. was Intro To Astronomy, taught by a funny old German guy named Heinrich Eichorn who, I later learned, was Chair of the Astronomy Department. (Yes, this was back in those quaint old days when top-notch professors had to actually, you know, teach class. And not just…
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Like all great rock bands, U2 has always has always had the ability to reinvent itself. Just when you think it’s completely washed out and finished, the members come up with another great album. They did it in 1991 with Achtung Baby and again in 1994 with How to Assemble an Atomic Bomb. The best…
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Author’s Note: A few days ago I saw that a remake of the sci-fi classic Forbidden Planet is in the works. So, I thought I’d repost a short essay I wrote about it some years back on my old blog, Bakhtin’s Cigarettes. Enjoy! The first DVD I bought was Blade Runner. The second was Forbidden Planet. This latter…
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I have a theory about horror novels. The secret to a good horror novel, I think, is not gore, or violence, or even suspense. The secret is empathy. The empathy we, as readers, form for the main characters, and the empathy the main characters feel for each other. This should be obvious, but it’s not.…
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Ash Clifton, Writer 