Covenant Rising (Magritte Monday)

Today's "Magritte Monday" entry is, like most of these, based on the surrealist painter's famous "Le Château des Pyrénées" floating rock painting.

To the right is the cover art for The Covenant Rising: Book One of The Dreamtime by Stan Nicholls. The art itself is by Matthew Stawicki. Looking at it, I wonder if it is somewhat computer-generated. In this age when computer books encroach inevitably on paper-books, computer graphics are found in more and more book covers that uses to be designed using real paint.

I do own this book, and yes, I bought it for its cover. But I love epic fantasy anyway. I've not read it yet. It is on my "to be read" stack.

"Covenant" is found in the title of other fantasy books: the "Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever" by Stephen R. Donaldson. In these books, the covenant is not a concept of an agreement, but is instead the surname of the main character, who is a rather dislikable fellow. I like these books, despite the hero, and feel that the latest one I read is the best yet.

Today's independent bookstore is the Book Peddler in West Yellowstone, Montana. When I was there years ago, they were trying to get me to buy books by a a local writer, a kid, who was going to be a very famous author. His name was Christopher Paolini, and he did become very famous, as the writer of the "Eragon" young adult fantasy novels about dragons and dragon riders. The postcard below is a "Large Letter" postcard from the mid 20th century:


And below is a set of relevant Amazon.com links:

Happy Birthday, Princess Leia and Kim Cardassian

I heard on the radio this morning that today is the birthday of Carrie Fisher ("Princess Leia") and Kim Kardashian.

I've seen 5 Carrie Fisher movies that I can recall. The first three "Star Wars" movies, "The Blues Brothers", and one called "Postcards from the Edge". This last one did not actually star Carrie Fisher, but was based on a book she wrote.


Kim Kardashian, according to the radio announcement, is the biggest "Reality Show" TV star. I've never watched her show. I guess I leave it up to others to keep up with the Kardashians.

"Kardashians don't keep up with themselves. Someone's gotta do it"

Reality shows I have watched include a few seasons of the Trump show, the Richard Branson "Rebel Billionaire" show, and a little bit of the first season of "Survivor". Oh, I also watched Stan Lee's "Superhero" show. I would have watched the planned astronaut reality show that would have put the winner on MIR, but that never panned out.


Yes, the Kardashian ethnic Armenian name is very close to the Star Trek Alien race "Cardassians". The best of the many "Star Trek" novels I have ever read was "A Stitch in Time" by Andrew J. Robinson, a great story of a boy growing up in a harsh society that trancends "Star Trek".

Below you will find the list of relevant Amazon sales links that I sometimes provide. However, to provide some balance, I will from now on present an independent bookstore (or perhaps a music store) every time I present the Amazon links.

Today's independent bookstore is Dog Ears Books. Run by fellow blogger P.J. Grath. It is in Northport, Michigan, and is a very well run independent bookstore featuring books on Art and Architecture, Foreign Languages, Michigan Adventure Fiction, Michigan & the Great Lakes and other subjects. And yes, there is a dog there.

Columbus Day

It's Columbus Day. What better way to celebrate than with postcards of Columbus, Ohio? Next week, I will say yes to Magritte Monday.

I've never been to Columbus, and actually only know it from old postcards.

The view below is from the 1940s. The Neil House, a hotel, was demolished in the 1970s, but the tower (now known as just the La Veque Tower) still survives.

This view from the early 1970s shows the Lazarus Department Store in downtown Columbus. It makes me think of the Winfred-Louder department store from downtown Cleveland (as per the Drew Carey Show). While Winfred-Louder died and was replaced with "The Never Ending Store", Lazarus abandoned this downtown store and was absorbed by Macy's.
Below is Ohio's famous unfinished capitol building, in a postcard from 1908. Oh wait, it is actually not unfinished. Architect Isaiah Rogers insisted that the expected capitol dome not be part of the design.

DALLAS 2012

I'm not a fan of night time soap operas. Or soap operas in general. But I admit there are two night time soap operas that I have enjoyed in the past. One of them is "Dallas". I'm not saying what the other one is. No, it's not "Dark Shadows", but if I ever saw that one I assume I'd like it too.

"DALLAS" is coming back next year. As a fan of the old show, I think this revival seems to be hitting the right notes:




I've been in Dallas once. I did not see the Southfork ranch, but it is nearby. It is a tourist attraction, and a place for weddings and other gatherings. But for the life of me I can't imagine why a new bride and groom would want their married life to start out with associations with the cheating and conniving married couples from "DALLAS":



I did however get a nice picture of the Dallas skyline. The sky at the time was Gary Indiana gunmetal gray, which made for a gloomy photo. So I put in a better sky:

Three Songs - Bonnie Tyler (and Magritte Monday)

Today's "Three Songs" features Bonnie Tyler. The cover art for an album that features one or two of her songs appears to the right. Calling this Magritte-like is probably a stretch, but it is surreal, and the sky contained inside a cube is similar to Magritte's sky contained inside a bird.

I always thought Bonnie Tyler sounded like a female Rod Stewart. One blogger commented: "When a singer has throat problems severe enough to require surgery, the procedure can often be career threatening. In the case of Bonnie Tyler, however, the nodules that she developed singing in nightclubs in her native Wales turned out to be career making. After her 1976 operation, Tyler's voice carried a distinctive rasp somewhat reminiscent of Rod Stewart's".

She's best well known for "It's A Heartache" and "Total Eclipse of the Heart"

The first one, below, is rather country-tinged and actually sounds like something Rod Stewart would have sung:



Probably many of you know the ambitious power balled "Total Eclipse of the Heart". I rememeber well the video, with its army of Fonzies, blowing cloth, and glowing-eyed kids. The video below is a "literal video" version, with a Tyler imitator commenting on the many odd things in the video. This version has a cat frame around it in order to get around Sony's attempts to censor the video. My favorite line is "It started out as Hogwarts now it's Lord of the Flies". Watch it while you can before Sony censors this one;



This last one is from Mike Oldfield's album "Islands". Mike Oldfield achieved immense fame in the US as a one-hit wonder in the 1970s with his theme from "The Exorcist", which has since become the de-facto theme song for Halloween. One song from the album, "Magic Touch" was a top 10 rock hit in the US in 1988, but no-one remembers it and it gets zero oldies station airplay. The title track "Islands" was a big hit in Europe.

The video version below is a live one with "Bonnie Taylor" (sic):



If you like "Islands", you might like an alternate version called "When The Night's On Fire".

Like most artists, Tyler has not burned out in a flame of "VH1 Behind the Music" glory, nor is she a modern superstar. She has kept on with a busy career in relative obscurity (at least compared to her 1980s work).