MIKE NELSON’S MIND OVER MATTERS

Name: MIKE NELSON’S MIND OVER MATTERS
Author: Michael J. Nelson
ISBN: 0-06-093614-2

by Michael J. Nelson ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2002

From someplace called Minnesota comes a Nelson funnier than Ozzie, Ricky, Lord or Half. Nimble foolery packed in minipieces.

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The author of Mike Nelson's Movie Megacheese (not reviewed) and quondam host of Comedy Central’s Mystery Science Theater 3000 offers some small, comic essays. The result is, happily, laughable.

In nearly 60 short pieces, Nelson covers the traditional bases required of funny authors and easily gains admission to the Professional Droll Writers' Union. He deals nicely with such facetious topics as the arts, outdoor life (with animals), indoor life (with relatives), recalled youth, food, human anatomy, coping with life, and general introspection. He has difficulties, like Great-Grandfather Leacock, in diverse everyday settings. He delivers a generic business speech that could easily precede Grandpa Benchley's immortal Treasurer's Report. And, like Cousin Dave Barry, he sees value in eponymous book titles. The good old subjects of pique include hotel stays and semi-amateur theatricals. Other, more modern, takes cover cell-phone shouters, big-box stores, and performance art (semi-amateur theatricals). Nelson reveals that he's for flesh-based food. He asserts, in another thoughtful think piece, that the heyday of the buttock is past. Especially neat is a thumbnail novel in the mode of Dickens, or someone very like Dickens, in which the final colloquy calls for a performance in the style of the late Stepin Fetchit or, perhaps, someone very like the late Lionel Atwill. And there's a fine little history of television that could only have been produced after some pretty shameful viewing and detailed study of many fanzines. Certainly, not all of Nelson's columns stand equally well, but the memoirs and prescriptions, the discourses and proscriptions are, on the whole, bright and easy. Take them a bit at a time and savor the once and (we pray) future world of comic writing.

From someplace called Minnesota comes a Nelson funnier than Ozzie, Ricky, Lord or Half. Nimble foolery packed in minipieces.

Pub Date: March 1, 2002

ISBN: 0-06-093614-2

Page Count: 288

Publisher: HarperEntertainment

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2001

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

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NUTCRACKER

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

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This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)

Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996

ISBN: 0-15-100227-4

Page Count: 136

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER AND THE MOUSE KING
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER
by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

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An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.