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Tag: paperback (Page 24 of 40)

News Flash! (No. Not that kind of flash.)

September 6, 2013 /

Pssssst! Did ya hear the news?

Oooh! Oooh!

Sometimes the big news is just gossip. Hollywood stars and their antics. Scandals. There have always been those pesky scandals. Then – there was a time when gossip WAS the news.

Flash from the October 20, 1889 Bryan (TX) Eagle, which arrived in the mail this morning as part of a research project I’m working on:

Walter Whipprecht went to Austin yesterday.

Woo.

And from the same top-of-the-page column under the THURSDAY headline:

Major W. R. Cavitt went to Dallas yesterday. Squire J. M. Zimmerman of Kurten was in the city yesterday. W. B Hancock from Boston registered at the Exchange hotel yesterday.

Can you imagine the size of the Tulsa World if these items were still reported? But – it was news back then, why isn’t it news today?

Some things never change though. Under the CITY COUNCIL headline was this note:

A committee from the tire department appeared before the council and a somewhat lengthy discussion of differences was held, resulting in a postponement of action until the next council meeting.

That could have been written last night for this morning’s paper.

Writing styles change with the times. Some words from the 19th century just don’t make it into news copy any longer. For example, this bulletin from the Indian Territory:

THREE SHOT AT INDIAN DANCE

Ardmore, I.T. Oct 18 – During an Indian dance near Mill Creek, 30 miles from here, promiscuous shooting was indulged in by unknown persons.

Promiscuous shooting, you’ll note. Today, those unknown persons would be called “shooters.” Earlier, the term gunman was in favor. That one “went missing,” but back in the day it would have simply “disappeared.”

The accompanying picture shows the turn-of-the-century newspaper delivery system. The circulation department, if you will. These fine lads were set to send out the day’s edition of the Winfield, Kansas Daily Free Press. The clothes may have changed (and what I wouldn’t give for a couple of those stylish hats!) but the bicycles could pass for today’s rugged mountain bikes.

The photo is from 1914, just a few years beyond the great heyday of the bicycle – a sporting craze that began in the late 1880s and early 1890s. Before that, the newspaper delivery might have been on foot or horseback. Automobiles were still fairly uncommon, particularly on the roads in smaller towns like Winfield. (You’ll notice the lack of paving and the muddy tires on a couple of the bicycles.)

Oooh! Oooh!

This just in: John Henry was here from Payne Prairie yesterday!

Film at eleven. (Wait a minute. Film is out. Never mind.)

We’ve got books about the Old West and newspapers: Come visit!

McHuston

Booksellers & Irish Bistro
Rose District
122 South Main St, Broken Arrow OK!

A Dickens of a Day…

August 24, 2013 /

The lady came back to the checkout counter and glanced at her companion, then looked me straight in the eye and said, “Tell her about William Wallace.”

Smack me. What?

Do I have a forehead tattoo? History Geek? Maybe inked in Old English Script?

Alas – the gauntlet was thrown down.

“Do you have a couple of hours?” I asked the companion, then gave the four-minute synopsis of the Scottish legend who gathered the always-feuding clan families together long enough to defeat the British in 1297.

I wasn’t around back then, but it is known as the Battle of Stirling Bridge. You’ve guessed by now that she had me pegged correctly. Truth is – I am a bit of a history nut.

But – what came over that woman to suddenly demand a medieval dissertation of me? We had not been talking about Scotland, bagpipes, broadswords, or even history. Well, I did mention the year 1847 when I was showing her the date on an antique copy of The Pickwick Papers.

Maybe I’ve the late afternoon scent of a kilted Highlander. I’ll hit the deodorant stick after I rub off that head-tattoo.

Not a historic day, here in the Rose District, but it has been somewhat history-oriented. Sold a copy of Beowulf. George Orwell. Fahrenheit 451.

The nice lady who pressed me for a lecture on the Old World had just purchased an illustrated edition of Oliver Twist. Of course, a good day is made even better when a copy of Dickens goes home with its new family. Honestly, that lady was after my heart: she asked about the book because of the George Cruikshank illustrations.

Dickens went through several artists during the course of his writing career, but his books were loaded with drawings, a fact that nearly shot me down in freshman English. We were reading a Tale of Two Cities. (In truth, the rest of the class was reading the assigned work.)

I wasn’t reading. Not a bit.

Mike Green – my aspiring artist friend – and I were too busy drawing freehand copies of the wonderful Hablot Knight Browne illustrations. It was a competitive thing. A sketcher’s version of a footrace. We’d both begin the hour with a blank piece of paper and a Parker brand ink pen, then before the hour was up, we’d pass the finished drawings around in secret for our fellow students to grade. (Click on the image for a better look at Browne’s skill. It’s an illustration from Tale of Two Cities of the sort we plagiarized during class.)

Some days Mike had the better drawing. Other times, I got the nod. Neither of us got the plot of the Tale, since we hadn’t read a thing beyond the captions accompanying the illustrations.

I’m ashamed to say it was years and years later when I finally sat down with Charles Dickens and he became my best friend. At least, he became my best dead literary friend. And Oliver Twist is a favorite acquaintance – especially the George Cruikshank illustrated version.

There’s a copy over there waiting for its new family.

Come visit!

McHuston

Booksellers & Irish Bistro
Rose District
122 South Main St. Broken Arrow OK!

Catching the 3:10 to Yuma and points Beyond.

August 20, 2013 /

When I finished the last page, I started to shut the book, but – out of curiosity – turned to the copyright page. I couldn’t believe it.

1969.

If not for a reference to the price of a house in Detroit and Tigers’ pitcher Denny McLain the story could have been written this week. Well… more than likely there were other references, but certainly nothing jarring. I remembered McLain on the mound back in the day so that stuck out as a little dated. There are plenty of books that don’t hold up so well over time.

The Big Bounce was filmed in 2004 and hopefully Elmore Leonard got a vacation out of it. His novel was set in his longtime hometown of Detroit but they set the movie in Hawaii. Probably a party-set thing for actors Morgan Freeman and Owen Wilson. There were a number of other areas that departed from the book and I’m guessing that’s why the film has a 16%-positive rating on a review website.

I thought the novel was pretty good.

In the shop here, you’ll have to look in three separate locations to find all the titles by Elmore Leonard, but – in this particular case – it isn’t due to my disorganization. It’s more a reflection on the diversity of Mr. Leonard’s writing.

Many of his stories are recognizable as successful films. (26 of his works have been adapted for movies and television.) Most of his works are in the mystery section. 3:10 to Yuma and others like it are over among the Westerns. That title has been filmed twice, with the latest version starring Russell Crowe pulling over 80% on the critics rating scale (on Rotten Tomatoes site). They stuck pretty close to the Leonard version.

For a guy actively writing for more than half-a-century, Mr. Leonard never lost his sense of urgency. At age 84, he was working on a new novel that would have incorporated the main character of the F/X network program Justified. The show is based on a couple of Elmore Leonard stories, so he would have been borrowing his own character back.

His son Peter says Mr Leonard never recovered from a stroke suffered a little over three weeks ago and lost his battle earlier today.

With titles like Get Shorty, Jackie Brown, and Freaky Deaky, the prolific author will live on – a timeless legacy of the Dickens of Detroit.

RIP.

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