Year in review

As the year is coming to an natural end, it’s time to look back at the books I’ve read, the movies I’ve seen, the music I’ve heard and the games I’ve played and sort out the weed and look at what really rocked my boat in 2008.

Bear in mind that these are just what I read, saw, heard and played in 2008, not necessarily what came out in 2008.

Books

I’ve keept tap of all the books I’ve read in 2008 on my LibraryThing account and have up until now read 60 books in 2008. That might sound like a lot but some of these where movie screenplays and graphic novels and they read a lot faster than regular books. But still 60 books is quite a number.

Best book of 2008: Hands down it gotta be Michael Chabon’s perfect (and I mean perfect) The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay. It’s been a long time since I’ve laughed so much, cried so hard and became so angry from reading a book. A true masterpiece.

Best comic of 2008: Again, a no-brainer for me; Brian Vaughan’s intelligent take on politics and superheroes Ex Machina.

Biggest waste of time in 2008: Lee Child’s Killing Floor came recommended to me from a bookstore clerk. Remind me never to take advice from him again. What a waste of good paper.

Movies

This was the year when I took my son to the movies for the first time, so in more than one way it was a very special year. He picked the movie; the new feature length Lucky Luke and it was such a success that the following four weekends afterwards we went to the cinema again to watch Lucky Luke again and Carsten & Gittes Filmbalade.

But all in all, I watched 99 movies either in the cinema or on DVD… and the award goes to… (couldn’t help it, sorry).

Best movie of 2008: Paul Thomas Anderson’s tour-de-force There Will Be Blood. It was grotesquely overlooked at the Oscars this year, even though Daniel Day-Lewis managed to grab the Best Actor award, I seriously think that in the years and decades to come we’ll look back a Anderson’s movie and give it the masterpiece status it deserves.

Biggest “What the fuck?!?”-moment of 2008: Halfway through the semi-funny Hancock, the movie completely changes into something it wasn’t suppose to be. Avoid this movie like the plague. All the funny scenes are in the trailer and that is only a couple of minutes long, so watch that instead.

Music

According to Last.fm my music taste didn’t change so much this year. But there are a couple of albums that I want to single out nonetheless.

Best album of 2008: Ryan Adams’ Gold. Barebones, simple melodic classic rock that just kicks ass. I can listen to this all day and still find nuances in it that I’ve somehow missed before.

Best jazz albums of 2008 that just keeps getting better: Also know as the BJAO08TJKGB Award. Ballads by John Coltrane and Kind of Blue by Miles David have, again, been on heavy rotation this year. Timeless albums that just keeps on giving.

Games

This was also the year when I finally shelled out for a Xbox 360 and I must say that I’m more than impressed with the system. The New Xbox Experience also added a modern and very nice interface.

Most fun game of 2008: That got to be Fable II. Extreme freedom, fun side quests, lush world to explore and nice rewards for being evil. What’s not to like?

Most awesome game of 2008: Grand Theft Auto 4. That game is just huge. HUGE I tell you. And the characters a great, the story is superb and very mature of a game. The size of this game and the content within it is just mindboggling. Kudos to Rockstar for setting the bar high again.

Biggest disappointment of 2008: Halo 3. What the fuck was all the hype about? I mean the game is extremely linear, the FPS aspect are “classic” (and that is not a compliment) and the story is just terrible and seems like it’s written by a 10-year old. The multiplayer is alright, but the singleplayer portion of the game was a huge disappointment.

The End

So there you have it, 2008 in review. What a year it’s been and I seriously hope that 2009 will offer just as many fine moments as this one did.

Here’s looking at you 2008.

Farewell, Carbon-Based Bipeds!

Rendezvous with Rama will for me always stand out as some of the best writing. Not just science fiction but fiction in general.

You will be greatly missed.

Dead man’s suit

I’ve started reading Joe Hill’s excellent Heart-Shaped Box and was really trying to keep the reading to daylight as the book seem to scare me shitless every time I think I have it all figured out.

Anyone familiar with the plot of Heart-Shaped Box know that the item that sets all the maladies and mayhem in motion is a dead man’s suit bought over the Internet. The suit apparently is accompanied by a ghost and the main character Jude’s life more or less goes south after receiving the suit.

Jude buys the suit because someone sent him an e-mail thinking the item would interest him.

Anyway, Joe Hill, the author, is as I am a LibraryThing user and I found his profile and library when plotting in the book in my library. He and I share a couple of great books so I flagged his library as “interesting”.

Now here comes the real scary part, Joe Hill saw this and sent me a private message online, which at first really freaked me out but after this initial shock had passed I found it really cool that Joe reaches out to his readers this way. It is always very scary when the fictional world collides with the real world in a sort of metaphysical way. It was like receiving my very own dead man’s suit by e-mail.

I of course replied to the message and hope to hear from Joe soon… now I just hope that I didn’t put some sort of curse on myself.

I !♥ corporate speak

I hate CEO and corporate speak especially if you’re not the CEO, but this book seems like a killer.

Anmeldelse: “Mønstergenkendelse”

William Gibson, manden der gav cyberspace sit navn, er tilbage med en ny roman. “Mønstergenkendelse” er Gibsons første nutidsroman, siden han i 1984 debuterede med den banebrydende science fiction fortælling “Neuromancer”.

Cayce Pollard er en mønstergenkender. Hun kan se sammenhæng, hvor andre ser kaos. Hun kan se strømninger i samfundet, om hvor moden og ideerne er på vej hen. Det gør hende til et uundværligt værktøj for reklamebureauer verden over. Hun kan på forhånd se om en reklamekampagne kommer til at virke eller slår fejl.Men samtidig lider hun af akut logo-allergi. Hun får det fysisk dårligt hvis hun udsættes for al meget visuelt kontakt med store verdenskendte logoer. Specielt de parisiske modehuses overklistring af deres kollektioner med eget logo får Cayce til at ryge helt ud af den. Det gør hendes arbejde som freelance “coolhunter”, som hun også kalder sig, mildt sagt noget problematisk.

Privat er Cayce blevet mere og mere involveret i debatforumet F:F:F (Fetish Footage Forum), hvor der diskuteres på livet løs om nogle meget korte og diffuse filmklip, som er begyndt at dukke op på Internettet.

Der synes ikke at være nogen kontinuitet i filmklippene. De er uskarpe og fortæller meget lidt om hvilken sammenhæng de tilhører. Men alle er enige om at det er ét samlet værk som er blevet brudt i små stykker og lanceret i vilkårlig rækkefølge. Sammenhængen er der, den er blot ikke til at gennemskue.

Cayce forsøger at holde sit privatliv og arbejde adskilt. Men gennem sit seneste freelance job i London før hun et tilbud af den meget karismatiske og pengestærke reklamemand Hubertus Bigend, som er svært at sige nej til. Bigend vil have at hun skal finde frem til hvem denne mystiske filmskaber i virkeligheden er. Han er overbevist om at filmskaberen er i gang med at skabe en banebrydende markedsføringsmetode og vil af forretningsmæssige årsager gerne i kontakt med ham/hende.Modvilligt påtager Cayce sig jobbet, simpelthen fordi nysgerrigheden om hvem filmskaberen er, er uudholdelig. Hun ønsker så inderligt at finde frem til budskabet og formålet med disse filmklip.

Da Cayce takkede ja til jobbet havde hun ingen anelse om hvilken turbulent rejse, hun nu begiver sig ud på. En rejse som bringer hende til Tokyo, Moskva, mystiske kunstnermiljøer i London og til nogle meget fjerntliggende egne af den civiliserede verden.

Fremtiden er nu

Året er 2002 og den globale choktilstand efter den 11. september har endnu ikke lagt sig. Verdenen af i dag er fremtiden. Fremtiden er nu.

Det er scenen for Gibsons nye roman. Den første nutidsroman fra hans hånd siden han bragede igennem med debutromanen “Neuromancer” for snart 20 år siden.

“Neuromancer” ændrede verden mere end de fleste af os nok er klar over. Ikke nok med at det var Gibson som “opfandt” ordet cyberspace, så var Neuromancer, der senere udviklede sig til en hel trilogi, med til at sætte billeder på den hastige udvikling der var, og er, inden for netværkskommunikation.

Virtual Reality og øjeblikkelig interkontinental elektronisk kommunikation var dengang stadig science fiction. I dag er det næsten forældet.

Formentlig er det derfor at Gibsons nye roman er tidsbestemt til nutiden. Fremtiden kommer så hurtigt, at vi ikke længere kan forudse, hvad der ligger rundt om hjørnet det næste tiår.

Fremtidens Raymond Chandler

Gibson er af mange blevet kaldt for det 21. århundredes Raymond Chandler (en af de største Noir-forfattere som i 1940erne og 50erne skrev bl.a. “The Big Sleep” og “The Long Goodbye”), og det synes for alvor at skinne igennem i denne nye roman. Dog har de to forfattere den Chandlers pistol-drevne dialog til forskel.

Men den evige jagt efter noget ubekendt, hvor læseren kun fortølles de små brudstykker som hovedpersonen langsomt graver frem, er fælles for begge forfattere. Plotdrejninger og overvældende afsløringer, er også noget de to forfatterskaber deler.

Gibsons nye bog er meget læseværdig. En af hans bedre gennem mange år. Den formår at tage pulsen på den globale markedsføring og blotlægge dens kalkulerende nådesløshed. Samtidig fremviser han en mesterlig forståelse for de subkulturer, der er opstået på nettet, og den til tider meget virkelighedsfjerne retorik og justits, der udøves sådanne steder.

Future Noir

Det kan altid anbefales at læse Gibsons bøger på originalsproget, selvom Arne Herløv Petersen er en god oversætter, kan det være svært at fange alle de sproglige finurligheder, som Gibson er så kendt for. Future Noir og cyberpunklitteraturen er kendetegnet ved den næsten lyriske leg med ord.

Den danske oversættelse er nu at finde i butikkerne landet over og den engelske original udgave “Pattern Recognition” findes i velassorterede boghandlere, eller købes online hos fx Amazon.co.uk (til en cirka pris af 250 kr.)

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Mønstergenkendelse
William Gibson
Oversat efter “Pattern Recognition” af Arne Herløv Petersen
People’s Press, Danmark 2003
368 sider | Kr. 350,-