A Momentous Decision

I think (I think) I have decided not to go to the comic shop this week. There are a number of reasons for this. The first two are interrelated – one reflects the other to the extent that I'm not sure which came first. They are: there aren't many comics out this week that I want (four, in fact: Dark Avengers, Irredeemable, Underground, and X-Men Legacy); and I'd quite like to save the expense of a trip to Brighton and the cost of four comics. On top of those two reasons, there are a couple of others, also interrelated: I don't feel a burning desire to buy any of those four comics (and indeed wouldn't lose any sleep if I didn't get, say, Underground, at all); and I'm still in the grip of a more general comics malaise – this in spite of drastically cutting down on my consumption.

So, for the first time in I-can't-actually-remember-how-long, I almost certainly won't be going to the comic shop this week. (Obviously I reserve the right to go anyway if the mood takes me.) This may not sound like a particularly momentous decision to anyone reading this (anyone? Anyone? Bueller?), but for me, it's a biggie. Or at least it would have been, not so long ago. Less so now. So clearly it's not a momentous decision for me either, thus making a nonsense of this entire post.

Anyway, on a not unrelated note, yesterday I strolled up to the amusingly named A. J. Cumming bookshop on the high street and emerged clutching this:













No, it's not a proper first edition; it's a Book Club edition. But it was only a fiver, and it's the same murky, moody cover as the first edition, and I haven't read it. Result.

To Rye-Aye

God that's a dreadful pun. Anyway, the Rye book fair was a fun affair, similar to the Lewes Book Fair, and with some of the same dealers too. A few circuits of the hall in Rye College produced a 1961 first edition of Gavin Lyall's The Wrong Side of the Sky for a fiver, sporting a cute jacket of a flier on a blue background. I can't find the cover anywhere on line, but it's a splendidly old fashioned wrapper. I shall look forward to reading that one (I also have a Pan edition of Lyall's subsequent novel, The Most Dangerous Game).

For anyone interested, Steve Holland has a good piece on his website about Lyall here.

Right then.

Rye book fair tomorrow. We'll see what that brings...

Ze List

Here's wot I done got this week:

Batman and Robin #6
Chronicles of Wormwood Last Battle #2
Punishermax #1 (Steve Dillon Variant Cover)
Supergod #1 (of 5)
Unwritten #7
Walking Dead #67

I also flicked through these:

Batman Doc Savage Special #1
Strange #1 (of 4)

but decided against them. And y'know, even the comics I did get I'm finding it hard to get excited about. The weekly trip to the comics shop is feeling more like a chore these days, like a habit. Just something to get me out of the office. I'm still feeling the books more than the comics at present. Just started on Stephen King's Under the Dome, and it's pretty gripping thus far, certainly more so than any comics I've bought. Should I stop going to the comic shop? Has it really come to that?

Oh,

and I was amused by the appearance (or rather non -appearance) in the The Anti-Death League of one L. S. Caton, who featured in Amis's first novel, Lucky Jim. How's that for a shared universe.

The Anti-Death League by Kingsley Amis (A Very Brief Review)

I finished reading Kingsley Amis's The Anti-Death League about a minute ago, and decided to Google the title and see what other people have said about the book. And blow me if the fourth hit wasn't this very blog. That gave me a start, I can tell you.

Anyway, it's a brilliant novel, not at all what I was expecting. The eponymous League barely features as such, but of course the whole novel is essentially about the League, even though it doesn't actually exist. Or rather, it's about death, and God, and love. And it has a wicked little kick in the gonads to finish it off.

(UPDATE: This post was written when I was still feeling my way around what Existential Ennui could and should be as a blog. If I posted it now, it would be more of a proper review and contain lots of nerdy information about the cover artist and so forth. I also wouldn't be so concerned with its Google ranking, although I can't say I've completely rid myself of that unattractively needy trait, as I did just notice this post currently lives on the second page of hits if you Google the book's title. Anyway, the novel has only grown in my memory. It is excellent. For more recent – and better – posts on Kingsley Amis, go here and here.)