"Clumsy"

Nearly every reviewer uses the word "honest" to describe this charming little autobiographical graphic novel, but I saw something else. The story spans a nearly one-year period of a great example of what not to do in a relationship. The author paints a picture of a strong willed, carefree woman and a clingy, emotionally immature man, both trying to "make it work" in a series of self-destructive, irrational events. It seems like this novel was written almost as an attack against the girlfriend, simply because she grew, while the boyfriend did not. She is shown as sacrificing her own personal pleasures to appease her boyfriend, to endure his tiresome clingy-ness when she just wanted to relax next to him.

You do not "make" a relationship work - it works because you share the same interests, goals and standards. You certainly don't compromise one individual's personality for another. The girlfriend was stifled in an atmosphere of stagnation from day one, and the boyfriend didn't seem to want to grow at all. He was in a perpetual state of "puppy-love", while she wanted something more. The only "honesty" I found in the story was the girlfriend's insistence to be herself, regardless of what the boyfriend demanded of her. My hope is that he grew from this experience, but I fear that this book proves the exact opposite.

Maybe I'm wrong. Hopefully I am.

On the plus side, it's all adorably hand-drawn and written, helping to convey a fragile, innocent feel to the entire story. Don't get me wrong, the story is written quite well, and I enjoyed reading it; I just despise the boyfriend's weakness. Also, the style really reminded me of the 90's, though I can't put my finger on just why.

Labels: books, Clumsy, graphic novel, review

This guy does it. I especially like that he points out the impossible combinations of dinosaurs from different eras, myths that were common about dinosaurs through the years, and illustrations that are just plain WRONG!

Labels: books, dinosaurs

I just finished Machinery of Freedom: Guide to a Radical Capitalism (finally); it doesn't typically take me this long to finish a book. This was the first book on economics that I've read, and it sounded like fun from the title (and a lot of it is actually fun), but it was a bit of a choppy read. Here's the thing; economists aren't writers. Friedman seems like a decent economist, and he might be a good professor, but he takes his time really getting into the meat of the subject matter, and in most cases, narrowly avoids being interesting at the last, crucial moment. The actual composition and layout of information is embarrassing (just plain poor writing), but the numbers embedded within tell the real story - if only they weren't outdated by about 30 years.

Friedman draws a lot of inspiration from Heinlein's The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress, as well as Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged and The Romantic Manifesto, which caught my interest. The thing is, this book could have been written so well, but it still stands out, simply because it was published at a time when Libertarianism, privatization and laissez-faire capitalism were frowned on by the post-1960's, Socialistic, Liberal masses (on the other hand, when were they not?) While I read it, I was constantly thinking "Ok, that's a sloppy way to present that idea, but I get it - but I would have worded it (x) instead of (y)".

I guess I was looking for a book that laid a foundation for Anarcho-capitalist principles, customs instead of laws, on-the-fly trials, neighborhood militias and volunteer police - instead, I got an economists treatment of these very ideas, with a focus on numbers and statistics instead of real-world comparisons. Still, for anyone the slightest bit interested in the subject I recommend reading it, bearing in mind that it was written in the 1970's (with an update in the late 1980's) and the numbers presented don't even come close to our modern economic climate.

I'm excited to start in on some fiction now, beginning with Heinlein's Waldo and Magic, Inc.

Labels: Anarcho-capitalism, Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand, books, capitalism, David D. Friedman, economics, Heinlein, Libertatianism, Machinery of Freedom, Moon is a Harsh Mistress, The Romantic Maniofesto