Review: It’s 1962 and a drifter finds his way to Trinidad, Colorado; a troubled Korean War veteran and would- be writer with demons galore. This is the setting for Burke’s 40th novel- a standalone book with all kinds of wisps and thread to his Bayou Robicheaux and Old West Holland series. Although a novel, this is clearly centered on Burke’s origin story, and it’s a potent piece of writing. The Denver Post has called Burke “America’s Best Novelist”, and Michael Connelly says he is “the heavyweight champion of fiction” (from the cover quotes). Though I think there is some room for debate on this, it can’t be far off. Burke is a combination intellectual literati and roughneck American everyman. His prose is not for everyone- you sometimes need a thesaurus to read a sentence (incubus? succubus…. the kind of words that appear regularly), but his wonderful storytelling with deep dark foreboding about evil and the purpose of man, along with a firm sense of America’s historical roots and their lasting effect on us (think slavery and Indian annihilation). This book is loaded with myth, symbolism and spiritual guide-seeking, all wrapped up in a coming of age story of young Aaron Broussard Holland. Check it out and be patient with it…it’s a marvel.
Notable People: Kate Winslet, Julianne Nicholson, Jean Smart, David Denman, Created by: Brad Inglesby
Title: Mare of Easttown
Review: Quirky seven-part mini-series that the critics were mixed about, but we found quite watchable. Winslet is a depressed detective in a small working class town in the northeast with lot of baggage. Complicated plot with lots of rough family dynamics. Shot grey and gritty and good ensemble cast performances. Dialog seemed over the top at times and the last episode seemed superfluous, but I was drawn into it. Masterful performance from Winslet in a real role departure for her. One and done, I think.
Review: Like Noir? Read Talton. The creator of the Detective/Historian David Mapstone series, once again sets his sights on Phoenix (he is fifth generation Arizonan), but this time in the 1930s at the height of The Depression. Talton lovingly depicts the beginnings of transition of his beloved Old West small dessert town to the lavish retirement oasis that it would soon become. Along with the remarkable development came all sorts of shadiness, graft, mob rule and dirty police work. Talton captures it well while weaving in a hell of a yarn. He also manages to capture the angst of the time and many of the more famous Phoenicians, such as Barry Goldwater, Bugsy Seagal and Del Webb. Dark, but comforting.
“Let me say it again: the present moment is all you ever have” ………………………………………………………………………………………………Eckhart Tolle
“It’s a marvelous night for a Moondance” ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. Van Morrison
“I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers” ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………L. M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables
It’s been a chilly, wet week here on The Mount. The leaves are almost all down; stick season is reaching full swing here in The Greens. People start to disappear in that grey time between Autumn and Ski Season. Is this a time of ending? beginning? A little bit of the loss of innocence along with the sunlight. Does anyone really embrace Daylight Savings Time?
We have begun the process of shutting down the homestead in anticipation of flying the coop on the 11th. The tchotchkes of our lives begin to disappear from the barn, the yard, the house……. driftin’ away with the leaves. But…….one last gasp this week took us up to the shores of Lake Champlain for our annual trek to the Islands of Vermont and Grand Isle……where lo and behold, the Lake Effect provides a late lasting, stunning array of Fall bounty on the shore outside our little cottage on what should by all measures, be a Great Lake.
Rituals……gotta love them….and we have developed quite the routines over many years of traipsing around the Northeast. Does anyone really believe there are Islands in Vermont? A quick two- hour plus trip takes us from the pastoral rolling hills and dales to the hidden wonders of large bodies of waters. Had the requisite stop in Brandon at the Café Provence bakery for breakfast and sweets loading, then up and around the fair metropolis of Burlington and across the bridge to the quaint Island environment and culture that is always a bit of a mystery …. lake cultures……a fascinating way of life, no?
Goin’ home, goin’ home….by the waterside I will rest my bones……Listen to the river sing sweet songs….and, rock my soul.
The Island trips are a quiet blur with hardly anyone around and many stores and restaurants closed up…. the magical wonder of a beautiful place left behind by the tourista hordes of summer. Not really a lot to do if you are pursuing activities: the usual jaunt to The Dunes , a few long hikes in the woods, gazing at the lake sunset through the glass cottage doors, the laps of the waves in bed at night….then there is the middle-of-nowhere, dirt road little Happy Bird Smokehouse, for their smoked chicken pot pie and spicy ribs to cook up ala cottage…..the little, but mighty, Alburg store for their bread and soup and munchies, the hipster bakery for bagels and bialys…..and the hidden orchards for the bull-goose looney of all Cider doughnuts…a world unto itself……remote charm with TV and WI-FI ….what’s not to love?
Not a lot else went on this sticky-week:
The Queen has now moved half of the mulch and most of the hay storage to the project de-la- obliterating of any yard grass.
Three year old Sloane did her first trick or treatin’ and TQ got skeletoned up to do our local Trunk or Treat………that is TRUNK with an “N” …. not an “M”.
We did a portal with Quin-Lily that expanded to five bedtime stories- at this rate we will be doing all-nighters by the time she is eight
The Dumpmaster and his crew wept openly at TQ not making the run for the third consecutive week….”is the little missus just laying’ round the house all naked?”
We both got our Moderna booster jabs on the way home from Island hopping, so ready to tackle the heartland and it minions.
The Prodigal has fully abandoned cash, and is now carrying around bags of crypto tokens.
The politically incorrect Atlanta Braves are whipping the Texas-cheaters in the Series.
The do-gooders are putting measures on town ballots around the state to tamp down the development of retail cannabis in our legal state.
When the winds come down on your one light town, can you look further on than you see? I’m an all-night singer in a rock and roll band, I’m just sittin’ on the edge of being free.
And, that, has got be all she wrote, Dear john…. just send my saddle home.
Notable People: Steve Martin, Martin Short, Selena Gomez, Amy Ryan, Nathan Lane, Tina Fey, Created by: Steve Martin and john Hoffman
Title: Only Murders in the Building
Review: As you can see, it is quite the Broadway oriented cast for this light and whimsical murder mystery set inside the kind of Manhattan grand apartment building we all dream about inhabiting. Dialog is snappy, all the acting is the quality you’d expect and the filming is nicely done. May seem a bit slapstick for some, and not everyone has a taste for Martin Short. But, Martin is aging gracefully, Gomez is a good fit and Amy Ryan steals the show as an aging, sexy bassoonist. No world changer, this one, but nice short viewing each week. Given the season finale, it is clearly coming back for a second season.
Notable People: Paul McCartney Created by: Rick Rubin
Title: McCartney 3-2-1
Review: Absolutely brilliant six-part series (1/2 hour each) on the music and times of the iconic former Beatle. I have never been a Paul fan- am solidly in the John camp on the Beatles divide- but this series changed my view of sir Paul immensely. What a joy ride through the development, fruition and end of The Beatles. Whatever junk Paul had with his soul brother, John Lennon, is now long gone and replaced with brotherly love. The film clips and recordings are amazing and Rubin is masterful at teasing Paul out and using his mixing board to show us the intricacies of the Beatles catalog, along with Paul’s alter work. Rubin is master record producer himself and an obvious adoring fan. Loved this guy, and loved this show.
Review: “I’m talking about those moments when you strip your gears, whether you’re chemically loaded or not, and get lost inside the immensity of creation and see too deeply into our ephemerality and our penchant for greed and war and willingness to destroy the Big Blue Marble, and for brief moment you scare yourself so badly you wonder why you didn’t park your porridge on the ceiling a long time ago.”
Are you kidding me? This sentence is form the first page of Burke’s latest in his iconic Dave Robicheaux series….in the second paragraph! Holy Cow. The Denver Post ha anointed Burke as “America’s best novelist”, and though I’m not ready jump on that with certainty, it’s certainly damn close. That said, Burke is not for everyone. You get lots of: these kinds of sentences that may require a dictionary, meandering searches for the meaning of life, ruminating on good and evil and aimless wandering around the historical subconscious of the Louisiana Bayou and the Deep South, in general. Robicheaux is a wonderful character, though by my count, he must be nearing 80 by now, while managing to maybe crack middle age in the stories. And his sidekick, Clete Purcell……. hard to describe, but one for the ages. These books get more mystical with time, and thus a little less believable, but his death defying stories are quite compelling and drag you into a world you probably have never even thought of. This is like visiting a very old friend for me.
Well, it’s been another slow week at Mount LeavesBeGone………………………………………the leaves slowly tumble through the hazy filtered sunlight…………………………the sticks re-emerge in the woods…………………………………I hear the train a comin’, It’s comin’ round the bend, and I ain’t seen the sunlight…. since…. I don’t know when………………nights approaching the 20s……seventy degrees a thing of the late lost summer……Gone with the Wind………how does it feel?……to be on your own……See the sap lines dot the woods like one giant spider web……people are strange….where have they gone?………….bracing for the next phase of mountain life……Kerouac, Ginsberg, Snyder, Ferlinghetti, blasting in my mind, from a million nights past…………………………think I’ll pack it in, and buy a pickup……………………………mountain time nears an end……….one last hoped- for- gasp pf Autumns’ splendor as we drift up to the Islands of Lake Champlain this week
Leaves, Leaves, Leaves……Pond, Pond, Pond……haul that bale…..Truckin’, down in New Orleans……help me, I think I’m fallin’……Ticks, ticks, ticks……spread the Doxycycline anti-Lyme miracle to bitten friends….the beasts are everywhere….look out, look out…………….the Candyman, here he comes….and he’s gone again….….Dumpmaster cries “don’t go”….or at least leave the missus…..what about all the mulch and cardboard….can the land yet become one large garden of rocks and blueberries?….sixty nine years of American Dreams……..ugghhhh…..Where are the men that I used to sport with?…..
Baseball has been berry, berry good to me……Sox have fallen to break the pioneer hearts of the great Northeastern Tribe…..autumn winds and baseball…..Amerika!………trippin’ solo to Middlebury- town to see the second coming of the shaman…crunch, crack…………aahhh……..how long have I been waitin’ for you, how long have you been on yer way………..Work, Work, Work……we gotta get outta this place, if its the last thing we ever do………..retirement memo apparently missed……Zoooooooomm…….where are the old dogs to teach new trix…………..New woods to ramble….out in the Mendon Orchards way……..Buenos’ Burritos……yes, yes, yes……….Johnson, Pfizer, Moderna….gotta jab me up…yeah jab me up….yeah, jab me up…..how much is too much?..
The sun is out; the Barn awaits……. Dear Prudence, won’t you come out and play-ay……the woods are lovely dark and deep, but miles to go before I sleep, miles to go before I sleep……
Friend of mine goes to hospital to get checked out……passes room with a guy masturbating……asks the nurse what is up with that…. she replies that the patient has rare condition and has to do it every hour to avoid symptoms…. shakes his head, continues down the corridor…. passes another room where nurse is going down on the patient…. catches the nurse and asks what about that…. nurse says same condition, better insurance……
Notable People: Billy Bob Thornton, William Hurt, Nina Arianda, Bruce Dern, J.K. Simmons Created by: Jonathan Shapiro and David E. Kelley
Title: Goliath
Review: the fourth and final season of this film noir TV series was the loudest by far. Full disclosure: I have never been a Billy Bob fan….but this series has given him the role of lifetime, and he has seized the day….Carpe Diem!!!!….Set in San Francisco and focused on the drunken, burned out lawyer who takes on Big Pharma, it is an homage to 1940s filmmaking, from the dark black and white dream sequences to the John Ford Western inserts and the Dashiell Hammet/Sam Spade like streets of Frisco moments…with a 40s sound track to match and so darkly me you’ll want to adjust your TV settings. The final scene set to Jack Kerouac reading his San Francisco blues to Errol Garners be bop piano is for the ages………and The Cast…. holy cow…. Simmons is evil personified in another of his fine acting performance, Dern is still kicking and hard to take your eyes off of, and Hurt…. well, it’s Bill Hurt. Billy Bob shines in this complex and sorrowful role, but the show belongs to Ms. Arianda as Billy’s brash, foul mouthed, unfiltered law protégé. This is a story foe our time ,and by the end you will be thinking that this should be happening in the real world, as Big Pharma and the crazed cycle of opioid profit meet their match.
Review: Another blockbuster documentary from the laureate, Ken Burns on the life a times of the great American author and icon. Amazingly well researched and delivered, like of all of Burns’ master works, this is the fascinating story of the brilliant and enigmatic king of American fiction. No stone is left unturned, and the story gets more and more difficult….a truly tragic and not all that sympathetic figure, whose genius shines through despite his many shortcomings. Getting Jeff Daniels to narrate the Hemingway parts is s stroke of genius- he’s prefect. And the steady narration of Peter Coyote, who does almost all of Burns’ work is compelling, as usual. The old photos and videos are worth the price of admission. Three two hour segments, but well worth the six hour investment.
