lookingland

for the

no. 32 ~ Dark Union by leonard f. guttridge, ray a. neff, and ray d. neff. oh boy. hahahahahahahahahaha ~ this is the kind of book that just makes you fall down laughing. every bit as bad as steers's review says it is, with appalling scholarship and ludicrous confabulation throughout. wow. bad.

no. 33 ~ A Court for Owls by richard adicks. another haha ~ this one is mostly funny for how lame it is (and the author's "creative license" excuses at the end just make it even worse). it was interesting to see a characterization (albeit brief) of Mr. Poppet by someone else's hand, but frankly i think this writer hasn't a clue who he's dealing with. i guess i should be glad this is such a lead zeppelin since i'm covering some of the same territory. this book is a good example of exactly what i don't want to do with my own writing: make a lot of crap up and not even use the "cool" stuff available to augment the story-telling! (in adicks defense, some of the current scholarship wasn't available then, but even so, it's no excuse for him making an otherwise riveting tale into a snoozefest.

and in extremely irritated news: innerliberry loans delivers and disappoints all on the same day.

got my history of the 4th pennsylvania (doesn't get more obscure than that). score!

but also got a notice that i have to buy Mr. Hanty's letterbooks from the commonwealth of pennsylvania ~ which i already knew and could have done four weeks ago! arghhhh ~ let this be a lesson for all of you who want something for nothing.

so now i have to order the dang thing (it'll cost me $50 ~ yikes) and then i have to wait another 4-6 weeks before i will even get it. then i have to find the time and fundage to make a hard copy of the blasted thing (it's on microfilm). all this and i have no idea what it actually contains or if it will be of any use whatsoever.

so i am not happy. already wasted a lot of time, but i'm convinced that i must have this because without it i'd be overlooking the key piece of a rather complicated puzzle. and without having seen the stupid thing and being able to say i read it, i could never in good conscience write this book.

so foo.

and piffle.

crab crab crab

i am exhausted.

: o p