I’m currently reading Last Argument of Kings, the final book of the First Law trilogy by Joe Ambercrombie, and I came across this little gem. Probably the funniest thing I’ve read all year. It’s location 903 in the book, whatever page that corresponds to.

With each thrust her head tapped against the plaster… With each thrust the table made an outraged creaking, louder and louder every time, as though they were fucking over the back of some disapproving old man.

Happy new year, all!

I finished Naked Heat, the second tie-in book they’ve released for Castle.  I previously wrote about how meta the book is. So here are some excerpts from the acknowledgments, signed by one “RC”, which is almost certainly the fictional Richard Castle:

…Special thanks are due to Detectives Kate Beckett, Javier Esposito, Kevin Ryan and Captain Roy Montgomery for not simply putting up with me, but including me in their professional family.

…and to Nathan, Stana, Seamus, Jon, Ruben, Molly, Susan and Tamala – your tireless professionalism makes every day a joy.

…A huge tip of my hat to… Melissa Harling-Walendy at ABC for her guidance aong the way.

So here we’ve got the fictional Richard Castle saying thank you to the other characters in his fictional world, but then also to the actors who play him and the other fictional characters. And then you’ve also got him thanking someone at the company who airs the show about his fictional character. … Wait, what?

We have to go deeper.  BBBBRRRAAAAHHHHMMM

Every so often, Nathan Fillion throws a reference to Firefly into current show, Castle. A few weeks ago it was him speaking Chinese and a quip after it. Now, they’ve also released two tie-in books to the show that are supposedly written by the lead character of the show. And yes, I admit it: I’ve read the books. (What, you don’t read tie-ins?) I’m currently working through the latest one, Naked Heat, and was pleasantly amused when I read this line (page 142 in the hardcover):

Heat didn’t like to bigfoot Malcolm and Reynolds, but she wanted to check out the Dragonfly herself.

So unless I’m reading into it, a ghostwritten book that’s credited to one character in a TV show (played by Nathan Fillion) made a reference to a character in a different TV show (also played by Nathan Fillion). I don’t know if that’s super meta or what, but I was amused either way.

Apparently someone is writing an Uncharted book. I’m not really sure why that’s necessary, but whatever. Here’s my girlfriend’s comment on it:

Oh god it will be so boring. “Nathan crouched behind a magically bulletproof log. He fired at the random guy shooting at him, then ran to the next log. He fired at the random guy shooting at him, then ran to the next log. He finally killed the random guy and then stood over the guy’s gun and bent his knees slightly to pick it up. Then some other guy started shoot at him. Nate crouched behind a magically bulletproof log…”

Certainly that version is better than whatever Uncharted fanfic is out there. (And yes, there is Uncharted fanfic.)

I never read comic books or graphic novels when I was younger, and in retrospect I feel like I missed out on something. I’m not really sure why I never did; perhaps I hung out with the wrong crowd for that sort of thing. I was too busy reading books for English class, and in my spare time I was reading The Belgariad and other fantasy genre novels. More than anything, though, I think it was one aspect of being a self-hating nerd, where I scoffed at people who read manga and things like that. (Actually, that’s still true.)

The main reason I bring this up now is because it’s being thrown back in my face. In particular, now that Hollywood has run out of ideas, they’ve turned to adaptations of graphic novels as a way to generate cash, and I feel lame because I don’t have a personal connection with what they’re releasing. I only read Watchmen after the film came out. I know Wanted was a piece of crap, but I’m still vaguely interested in reading the book. Scott Pilgrim actually started coming out when I was in college, but I’d like to think that I would have read it. It’s too late now, though; reading it would make me a poseur.

And yet, at the same time, I sort of want to start reading some. Maybe I’ll start with Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman.