S.G. Browne

So we’re kicking off Movie Review Mondays with Black Swan, directed by Darren Aronofsky (Requiem for a Dream, The Wrestler) and starring Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis.

The first thing I’ll say is that I found the acting to be excellent. I love Natalie Portman and found her portrayal of a fragile ballet dancer who wins the coveted lead role in her company’s production of Swan Lake both believable and heartbreaking. I’m also a fan of Mila Kunis, who brings a dark, playful sexuality to her role as Portman’s would be saboteur. And Barbara Hershey channels Faye Dunaway in Mommy Dearest as Portman’s controlling and resentful mother.

Without giving away any spoilers, the movie is a mix of fantasy and reality that ultimately becomes a tragic horror film. An odd mix, sure, but you have to remember we’re talking about the same director who helmed Pi and Requiem for a Dream. If you’re expecting a serious, mainstream film, you’re going to be disappointed. It’s more of a surreal art house film with psychological horror tendencies.

The negative reviews for the film have generally described it as over the top, campy, and descending into ridiculousness.  While there are moments of dark humor where the entire audience laughed and made me wonder if that’s the reaction Aronofsky was hoping to get, I was compelled by the tragedy of watching Portman’s character descend into a madness brought on by the pressure of her success. You know it probably won’t end well for her and while you aren’t emotionally invested in any of the characters, it’s still sad to watch.

Next post: Wild Card Wednesday

I know that gift cards have become the easy thing to, well, gift to friends and loved ones for the holidays. And I’ll be the first to admit that I’ve received some clunker gifts without the option of exchanging for something I’d rather have. But everyone likes to read. And if they don’t, they should get in the habit. There’s nothing like a good story to take you someplace new.

So with that in mind, I’ve listed a handful of options (minus the thumb) for better gift giving through fiction. Feel free to include some of your own suggestions. But just remember to include a gift receipt.

Water for Elephants, Sara Gruen
The tale of a ninety-three-year-old nursing home resident who reminisces about his time spent working in the circus to the point that he almost begins to lose track of what’s real and what’s not. The characters are delightful, the story intoxicating, and the prose inspired.



Lamb, Christopher Moore
The lost years of Jesus through the eyes of “Levi bar Alphaeus who is called Biff,” Christ’s childhood pal. I found myself laughing, enthralled, educated, appalled, and thoroughly entertained all at the same time. You’ll never look at Christianity the same way again.



Life of Pi, Yann Martel
Pi, son of a zookeeper whose family is emigrating to North America, finds himself the lone human survivor of a shipwreck in a lifeboat with a hyena, an orangutan, a wounded zebra, and a 450-pound Bengal tiger. A funny and thoughtful adventure of a read.



In the Woods, Tana French
A cold-case double murder in the suburban woods of Dublin is revived twenty years later by another murder in the same woods. Narrated by a detective with a shadowy past connected to the double murder, this debut novel is part mystery, part psychological thriller, and nearly perfect.

We’ve reached the end of the alphabet, which culminates with a single title for each of the letters Y and Z. And with the dearth of titles I’ve read for both of them, I decided to combine the two letters here.

And by dearth, I mean I haven’t read, or can’t recall having read, any other books that begin with the letters Y or Z. Is there something I should have read? Something I should read? Like I need to add more books to my TBR pile, which is already almost an entire shelf on one of my bookcases.

But before I get to the final two titles of my Favorite Reads From A to Z, I just wanted to thank everyone who’s given this a glance and stopped by to thrown down the occasional comment. I hope you enjoyed the posts and found some titles that you’d never considered picking up before. Happy reading!

And now, to wrap this up…

You Suck: A Love Story, Christopher Moore
The sequel (after twelve years) to Bloodsucking Fiends, this one picks up with Tommy, the frozen-turkey-bowling night shift employee at Safeway, discovering that he’s just been turned into a vampire by his girlfriend, Jody, who recently became a vampire herself. Things get complicated when Tommy’s turkey-bowling buddies find out he’s a vampire. Throw in a a homeless Emperor, a blue-dyed Vegas call girl, and a vampire cat named Chet, and what you get is classic Christopher Moore. The diary entries from Abby Normal, Tommy and Jody’s goth minion, steal the show.

The Zombie Survival Guide, Max Brooks
Arguably the book that laid the groundwork for the zombie madness that has engulfed film and fiction. This always practical, often enlightening, and frequently amusing manual about how to survive a zombie attack is filled with helpful advice such as: Use your head, cut off theirs; and Blades don’t need reloading. With weapon and combat techniques and case histories of recorded zombie outbreaks, this book has it all. A must read for anyone who wants to survive the zombie apocalypse.

Or, as Charles Montgomery Burns says: Exxxcellent!

Since there aren’t any titles that make the list for my favorite novels beginning with the letter X (and since I’ve never read any books that start with an X), I thought I’d use this entry to list my most excellent reads, or my Top 10 Favorite Reads from all of my previous entries.

In no particular order…

The Best of the Best

Lord of the Flies, William Golding
Favorite novel, hands down. The death of Simon still haunts me. Who’s got the conch?

Lullaby, Chuck Palahniuk
My gold standard for dark comedy and social satire. One of the most influential novels I’ve ever read.

The Stand, Stephen King
First time I ever mourned the death of a fictional character. King is the greatest storyteller of our time.

Cat’s Cradle, Kurt Vonnegut
A calypso based religion, a midget, and the end of the world. All blackly hilarious. Only in a world imagined by Vonnegut.

Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury
Nearly 60 years later, it’s still one of the greatest science fiction novels ever written.

The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald
Elegantly crafted sentences that just hum with the beauty of the written word. An inspirational read.

Wicked, Gregory Maguire
Before there were mash-ups, Maguire showed how to take a classic story and breathe new life into it. Exceptionally smart and entertaining.

Lamb, Christopher Moore
Nobody does humorous irreverence like Moore and this one stands alone on a podium built for one.

American Psycho, Bret Easton Ellis
One of the most disturbing, compelling, and entertaining novels I’ve ever read. A brilliant piece of writing.

The Big Sleep, Raymond Chandler
A voice like no other. Chandler set the bar for detective noir and it’s never been challenged.

Close But No Cigar
High Fidelity (Hornby), Wonder Boys (Chabon), Geek Love (Dunn), A Dirty Job (Moore), Invisible Monsters (Palahniuk), The Shining (King), Catcher in the Rye (Salinger), 1984 (Orwell), Lolita (Nabakov), and In Cold Blood (Capote).

The W’s presented a bit more of a challenge than the prior two entries, as I’ve read more than fifteen novels that begin with this letter of the alphabet. While the top two were never in any serious danger of being left off the final ballot, the last one was a tough call and could have gone four different ways. In the end, and admittedly after some serious flip-flopping, I had to leave Watership Down (Adams), Wonder Boys (Chabon), and A Wrinkle in Time (L’Engle) on the outside looking in.

Other notable and memorable titles I’ve read that begin with W include The Witching Hour (Rice), War of the Worlds (Wells), Wolf’s Hour (McCammon), Watchers (Koontz), The Waste Lands and Wolves of the Calla (King), World War Z (Brooks), Where the Red Fern Grows (Rawls), Wuthering Heights (Bronte), and Walden (Thoreau).

The three that made it? A famous witch, a circus fable, and an epic search for a dark tower.

You’re the Top
Wicked, Gregory Maguire
I know the musical adaptation made a lot of noise, but give me the book every time. The story of the Wicked Witch of the West prior to Dorothy’s arrival in Oz paints a very different picture of the events that eventually unfolded after Dorothy’s arrival. Filled with heartache, humor, romance, political intrigue, and social commentary, Wicked does a great job of making you see the alleged villain’s side of the story. If you’ve seen The Wizard of Oz, then you really need to give this a read.

Two Mints in One
Water for Elephants, Sara Gruen
My favorite book I read in 2009, I got completely swept up in the story of a ninety-three-year-old nursing home resident who reminisces about his time spent working in the circus to the point that he almost begins to lose track of what’s real and what’s not. The characters are delightful, the story intoxicating, and the prose inspired. A wonderful ride back in history to the circus heyday of the early twentieth century.

Three on a Match
Wizard and Glass, Stephen King
The fourth installment in King’s The Dark Tower series, Wizard is, in my opinion, the best of the seven. I also believe it’s just flat out one of King’s best novels. If the purpose of storytelling is to get the reader emotionally swept up in the lives of its characters, than this does the job. I remember getting chills reading certain passages and chapters as the book neared its end. Read the first three installments of the series just to get to this one.

*Bonus Titles: The Play’s the Thing
Waiting for Godot, Samuel Beckett
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Edward Albee
Although completely different on every level, these are two of my favorite plays to read. Both Beckett and Albee are masterful.