[Doc Faustus]

Steer clear of Mysteries of Udolpho. Challenging oneself is one thing but that book is tedium incarnate and contains snippets of some of the worst damn poetry you'll ever read Right now I am reading my friend Jess Gulbranson's book 10 A Boot Stomping 20 A Human Face 30 Go to 10, which is published by Legumeman, the Australian press I work with. I read about half of it then got busy, but I should finish it and have a blurb for him soon. It's a ton of fun, a book about hauntings, conspiracy theory and how we interact with pop culture. One of the things I love about Bizarro is that it doesn't sacrifice intelligence for fun or strangeness for excitement, even in the most scatological or apparenly silly books in the genre. After this, I move onto William Pauley III's Doom Magnetic, which I'm excited about. I've heard from people who read it that it's a reading experience closer to going to the movies than other books are and that it's weird and full of genrebending and excitement, so it should be a good experience. I've been reading the Tao Te Ching a lot too.