Grabbed this up at Borders Express last night...pure guilty pleasure...can't put it down...Amazon is loaded with positive reviews, including this terrific one:

142 of 144 people found the following review helpful:


5.0 out of 5 stars MHI, February 2, 2008

By Kevin J. Coolidge - See all my reviews

(REAL NAME)



This review is from: Monster Hunter International (Paperback)

Monster Hunter International



It's your average, everyday Wednesday evening; I had just stopped by to pick up the latest issue of the Wellsboro Gazette. Suddenly, I found myself able to fulfill the American dream. No, not the one with the nude roller derby girls, the other "American" dream. I got to run over my boss. Understand, I felt obligated to burn hot rubber across his hairy back. No, I didn't wake up that morning and plan on killing my boss with my Subaru. It's really much more complicated than that. I would never have considered doing something that sounded so crazy. Heck, I work in a bookstore. My idea of danger is getting a paper cut. I didn't want to save the world. I didn't want to have to replace my headlight. I didn't want my insurance rates to skyrocket. I didn't want to know my boss was a werewolf...



It turns out that monsters are real, and that's why I found myself devouring Monster Hunter International by Larry Correia. Creatures from myth, legend, and B-movies are out there. Lurking in the shadows, seeking our destruction, or just plain hungry. Monster Hunter International is the number one agency for eradication of evil.



Our story starts with one Owen Zastava Pitt. He's your average, everyday working stiff. He just wants to work hard, get himself a wife and 2.5 kids, and settle in the suburbs, but when his boss literally tries to bite his head off, Owen is thrust into a world that he never knew existed - a world where monsters are exist, and there is good money to be made killing them. Welcome to Monster Hunter International.



MHI,a remarkable group of misfits that has banded together. They do more than dare to raise a candle to the darkness. They pack napalm-fed flamethrowers and lots of firepower. There's specialized body armor, big guns with unusual ammunition, and bloodsucking fiends. You'll also find some likable, well-developed heroes that bleed, and a full-speed action yarn that's funny as Hades.



I picked up this first novel because it sounded like a fun, fast read, and it is. Larry is a certified weapon instructor and it shows in his writing. He knows guns and weapons and he likes to blow things up, and have a lot of fun doing it. He also loves B movies, and has a twisted sense of humor, and it all makes for a highly entertaining read. It's not perfect. There are some rough spots, and at 452 pages, it's a little longer than is needed. The action slows down after a great intro that grabs your attention, but quickly jumps back to the fight. If you like SF, military fiction, or horror, you'll find yourself staying up late at night to finish, and anticipating the next novel. You aren't going to find MHI on the New York Times bestseller list, or Oprah any time soon, but maybe she should lock and load and lighten up...



Kevin Coolidge columnist Wellsboro Gazette
 
for more go here

A lot of people refer to "Pontypool" as a zombie movie, but there's more to it than numbed out cannibals and lots of blood. This 2008 flick, to me at least, is very underrated and its "less is more" vibe makes the off-screen implications far more scary than any obvious gore fest that goes on in most horror. (Of course the cover doesn't help make my case, does it?:)  )

Its take on what makes the 'zombies' go viral is one of the most interesting I've seen and might possibly change the way you think about the English language and language in general...

more soon...

cool site of the day:)

You might want to check out shoes...it's an interesting site!:)

Yesterday I was shopping at Whole Foods when the song "Electric Blue" came on over their loud speaker. It had been ages ago (maybe since it first was released?) that I'd last heard it and suddenly (against my will) I flashed to late 1987.

It's weird how certain songs and smells can send your mind reeling back to the past...as though both are some metaphysical form of time travel...not a metaphor for it...but actual time travel.

"Electric Blue" was a one-hit-wonder type deal by the group Icehouse and (to me, at least) sounded a lot like another late 80s hit called "Shattered Dreams" by Johnny Hates Jazz (also a group that never had another big hit again.) Both songs have this harmless enough sound, but somehow have the power to make me want to look for the nearest exit...the memories associated with them are sometimes too much.

Of course, I've found that "overexposure" to 'bad memory songs' can work wonders. I used to feel the same way about "Hungry Like the Wolf" by Duran Duran...but one day I sat down and played that song over and over until it lost its power and now whenever the song takes me by surprise I'm just fine:)

When I was going through my old cassettes the other day I found the soundtrack to the 1987 film "Hiding Out." I'd forgotten how wonderful it is, how much it used to mean to me and popped it immediately into my boom box (that I set up a few months ago after getting tired of nothing but constant streams and downloads of digital music.)

...in the 80s I really only loved two songs on it. "Real Life" by Black Britain and Boy George's opening track "Live My Life." But now I hear the cohesiveness of all the songs in relation to the angst and frustrations of teenage life and the film in general... (see here for full track listing)