Book Review: Cooked to Death

Book Review: Cooked to Death edited by Rhonda Gilliland and Michael Allan Mallory Let’s return to the world of themed anthologies, a quick way to get a sample of various authors writing on a particular topic. In this case, it’s primarily Minnesota and other Midwestern writers doing crime and mystery short stories around the topic… Continue reading Book Review: Cooked to Death

Movie Review: Jailhouse Rock

Vince sees Hunk's guitar for the first time.

Movie Review: Jailhouse Rock (1957) directed by Richard Thorpe Vince Everett (Elvis Presley) is a nice enough young man, even if he maybe spends too much time in bars. But once he loses his temper, he doesn’t know when to stop. When another patron at the bar starts abusing a woman who was hitting on Vince,… Continue reading Movie Review: Jailhouse Rock

Movie Review: Joe (2013)

Joe welcomes one of his crew back to the job.

Movie Review: Joe (2013) directed by David Gordon Green Joe Ransom (Nicolas Cage) is holding his life together…barely. He runs a small business that kills trees unsuitable for lumber for the local lumber company, employing a day worker crew that works hard for the cash money and appreciates that he doesn’t cheat them. Maybe he smokes… Continue reading Movie Review: Joe (2013)

Magazine Review: Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine September/October 2021

Cover by Brian Stauffer

Magazine Review: Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine September/October 2021 edited by Janet Hutchings “The years keep coming and they just keep coming.” It seems like just a few months ago I reviewed a 75th anniversary issue of Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, but in fact it was five years ago, and here’s the 80th anniversary issue. It’s… Continue reading Magazine Review: Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine September/October 2021

Magazine Review: The Masked Detective Spring 1942

This scene appears nowhere in the issue's stories.

Magazine Review: The Masked Detective Spring 1942 The Masked Detective is one of the lesser-known hero pulps, with a dozen quarterly issues between 1940 and 1943. The detective, usually just called “The Mask” in-story, was ace reporter Rex Parker for the New York Comet. He’d been persuaded by his girlfriend, society columnist Winnie Bligh, to… Continue reading Magazine Review: The Masked Detective Spring 1942

Magazine Review: Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine August 1953

Magazine Review: Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine August 1953 edited by Ellery Queen If you’re not picky about condition, you can find a lot of cool old magazines for very reasonable prices, like say a dollar for this 1950s EQMM. At this time, editor Frederic Dannay still used his pen name of Ellery Queen on the… Continue reading Magazine Review: Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine August 1953

Comic Book Review: Kaijumax Season Two: The Seamy Underbelly

Comic Book Review: Kaijumax Season Two: The Seamy Underbelly by Zander Cannon Note: This review contains spoilers for the previous volume, and you may want to read the review for that one first. After last season’s explosive ending, Electrogor and Green Humongo have managed to escape the title prison. Electrogor’s anxious to get to the cave where he left his children, but they need… Continue reading Comic Book Review: Kaijumax Season Two: The Seamy Underbelly