I've always liked Batman enough to read whatever issues happened to be at Borders.  I never bought them because I didn't have that much disposable income, the space to store them, or the initiative to figure out what was going on with a story line at any particular time.  Now I have an iPad and a slightly more mature attitude about supporting the arts I enjoy, so off to Comixology I went.

I started with all four Batman lines.  After three months, two of them have hooked me.

Batman and Robin is the surprise favorite.  The new Robin is a great character that stands far apart from the rest of the boy wonders and really challenges his father.

The runner up is Batman, which pits the Caped Crusader against a secretive, ancient, crime syndicate that has managed to avoid his gaze thus far.  I teed to see such groups as characters themselves and often prefer them to a single villain, so I'm hooked.

Dectective Comics and Batman: The Dark Knight are both really strong comics, but my budget is an evil evil taskmaster.  And as a bonus there are a ton of indie comics available as well, so you can be extra cool and support them, while I can't. 

Twenty pages in I set the Nook down.  “Cripes,” I thought, “This book is trying to make me think.  What on earth is going on?”

 So I looked it up on Wikipedia.  I leave myself open to literary snobbery.  The reader I was, studying for my English Degree is sneering, somewhere in the back of my head.  Still, a bit of an outline and a basic theme summary always helps.  I’m getting more out of the book and enjoying it more.  

I should have written these reviews out one by one but I was in love.  I loved John, who shares my bastard blood, Cersie, who reminded me of so many co-workers, Jamie, the prick who decided that he could be better, and Tyrion, the dwarf.  Now that I am in the legion of fans waiting for the next book, I feel quite. lost.  George RR Martin, in a way, you've ruined there rest of the written world for me.  

A Game of Thrones

I swear to the Old Gods and the current three faced Gods is this the best introduction to a fantasy series I've ever read.  It enthralled me, won my love and broke my heart in one swipe.  It left me with the following opinions, that I would decent into the fighting cages to defend: I will read the rest of the series, and it is totally worth the money HBO invested in the series.

A Storm of Swords

The last time I read a piece of literature that was so jam packed with convoluted political bullshit it was Shakespeare.  I honestly think Martin managed to top the Bard, but only for a 21st century reader.  If Martin was writing a play of old, he'd have a run for his money.  I opened this book wanting, no craving, dialogue concerning certain set of characters and was denied time upon time.  In it's stead was a tale of incest, deceit, love, money and the one quality that bonds all of those vices together, power.  This book left me savoring of the next and I opened that file with no consideration of foresight of the net book.

A Feast of Crows

In retrospect, if I were one of the many fans that finished this book and waited six years for the next one, I'd be calling for blood like so many of them were by the time Dance With Dragons was released.  It's obviously a split novel piece, which is normally fine in this day and age, but this day and age doesn't allow for a 6 year break in publications.  it was a noticeable departure from the rest of the novels, it centered on the center of the kingdom.  The narrative was far more political than before, but it had a certain taste of selfishness that I enjoyed tremendously.  The climax of this book led to me pumping my hand in the air, silently chanting the name of a point of view characters, because he growth as a man was that tremendous.  

A Dance With Dragons

I'm so angry right now.  Over the years I listened to friends bemoan the never ending Wheel of Time Series, and I promised myself that I'd never get involved with a book series that wasn't' finished. I assumed that as a late adopter to this series I would receive some amount of satisfaction to this enthralling literally series, but no, you just had to end it on a gigantic cliff hanger.  Now I open my Nook like a feverish drug addict, ready for that next hit, desperate to find out what happened to the Tyrion and the bloody horn.  Well, thanks.  It was the most mind blowing experience of fantasy, genera, literature that I've ever had.  I'm talking incessantly about it and naming co-workers after the characters they most reassemble.  I feel like a lover of notable accomplishment abruptly exited my life, leaving me simultaneously satisfied and abandoned.  Like the rest of my heartbreaks, I'm sure I'll recover quickly, but Gods, be gentle next time.

It took about twenty attempts to get this picture.  I realized how much I appreciated my freedom while deciding how close to stand.

I only had one requirement to like a song during my adolescence and early twenties.  It had to be fast.  I thrived on tempo, pumping my fists in the air or punching the beat into my car's dashboard.  I needed music that complimented my omnipresent anger. 

Drunken Lullabies by Flogging Molly went into my CD player and didn't come out for sixteen months.  It's artistic merit goes far beyond the limited appreciation of my youth but it's songs of fanatical religious commitment, and political anger made an awesome album, that mixed punk and folk at a furious pace.  I sweated off a good forty pounds to it.  

Time passed, the band evolved, and I managed to calm down a bit.  Two days after my thirtieth birthday Amazon had the good sense to dangle their new release in front of me.  I sneezed and must have hit that damn 1 click button.  Listening to it on my way to work gave way to reflection over the bands sound and my own changing tastes in music.

The title track is classic Molly, good pace, great music.  Dave King has a bit to say about the economic woes of American workers.  I heard my dissatisfaction of American imperialism threaded through the lyrics.  Each track invited a different musical theme and I enjoyed them all.  Some more than others but I certianally wouldn't have liked the album at nineteen.  (I intend that to say more about me than the band, ftr.)

As for the angry tastes of my youth?  I laid them to rest in a small humid kitchen, shortly after the lunch rush. 

"I was hoping for something closer to Drunken Lullabies," a cook barely old enough to buy his own beer said.

"I like it, and when I'm in the mood for Lullabies I'll listen to Drunken Lullabies," I said.